


Get Over It

by rotasha



Category: DCU, DCU (Comics)
Genre: Bisexual Bruce Wayne, Bisexual Clark Kent, Identity Porn, Journalism, M/M, Secret Identity, Slow Burn, idiots to lovers
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-02-12
Updated: 2020-08-11
Packaged: 2021-02-27 22:15:30
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 14
Words: 32,376
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/22673140
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/rotasha/pseuds/rotasha
Summary: Bruce needs to get over his inconvenient feelings for Superman and he meets an attractive reporter who he thinks can help him do just that. Little does he know...
Relationships: Clark Kent/Bruce Wayne
Comments: 412
Kudos: 1434
Collections: DC





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> Hey, it’s my third story on this account! If you’re new here, welcome. The only thing you need to know about me is that I only pay attention to the parts of canon that are useful to me. If comic writers are allowed to do it then so am I. I hope you enjoy yourself (and maybe check out my other work if you do). If you’ve read one or both of my previous stories, welcome back! You’re my favorite!
> 
> Also, this chapter kicked my ass. I rewrote it at least a dozen times before I finally got it where I want it so it better be good.

Bruce Wayne had a problem.

Actually, Bruce Wayne had many problems, as anyone who knew him could attest. But one in particular had recently come to the forefront, and now that he’d identified it, he knew it wasn’t going away any time soon.

It began on an unassuming day; a day like any other, as far as Bruce Wayne was concerned. Anyone else might have noted that it was Valentine’s Day, but Bruce had not been in a relationship that consisted of more than a string of casual hookups in his entire life, so this meant nothing to him.

“Sometimes I wish I knew who you were.”

They were standing on a rooftop in Metropolis after teaming up to defeat Lex Luthor and the Joker, who got along like oil and water yet persisted in working together every now and then for reasons Bruce couldn’t begin to fathom. This was normal for Batman and Superman. All their conversations took place on rooftops after a successful joint mission. Only most of the time, these conversations consisted of mission-related small talk, maybe an argument over who had risked their life unnecessarily to save who, yelling things at each other along the lines of “What were you _thinking_?” and “I had it under control!” Not bombshells like “Sometimes I wish I knew who you were.”

In fact, until then, Superman and Batman had expertly avoided the subject of secret identities. They knew virtually nothing about each other. Bruce didn’t know what name Superman went by in his everyday life, what job he worked to pay the bills, whether he was married or had any kids, where he’d grown up and gone to school and what his hobbies were. He didn’t _want_ to know any of these things, any more than he wanted Superman to know them about him. The more you knew about someone, the easier it was to get attached, and attachment was a vulnerability Bruce couldn’t afford in his line of work. Both of their jobs were easier if they could pretend around each other that Batman and Superman were all they were.

“You know everything you need to know,” Bruce told Superman tersely, thinking he’d better cut this line of inquiry off before Superman got it into his head that they were going to start sharing secrets. “And so do I.”

“Maybe,” Superman said, unfazed by Bruce’s threatening Batman voice. That particular voice had stopped working after the third or fourth or seventieth time Bruce used it on him. “But don’t tell me you’re never curious.”

Of course Bruce was curious. Solving mysteries was what he _did_ , and Superman’s secret identity was a tantalizing mystery indeed. But he restrained himself, because he respected Superman’s privacy, just as he expected Superman to respect his. He was under no illusions about the security of his secret identity; he knew it would take Superman all of fifteen minutes to figure out Batman was Bruce Wayne if he really applied himself, lead-lined cowl be damned. Between his x-ray vision and his other super senses, Superman was a difficult guy to keep things from. The only reason he hadn’t used those super senses to spy on Bruce’s private life, and Bruce hadn’t used his considerable investigative skills to look into Superman’s background, was that the two of them had an unspoken agreement: No looking into each other’s secret identities. Period.

“What you do in your off time is none of my business,” was all Bruce said.

“Come on. You don’t have any theories?” Superman goaded him. He got like this, sometimes, when he wanted to have a “real” conversation and Bruce wasn’t cooperating.

To this, Bruce said nothing, because again, yes, _of course_ he had theories, but he wasn’t going to share. Superman took Bruce’s silence as a sign to keep talking, which was an annoying habit he had. “Well, I have a theory,” he said. Bruce listened despite himself, thinking, _Oh, this’ll be good._ What theories would Superman have about Batman’s identity?

“I think you’re probably a cop,” Superman continued, “Fed up with all the corruption and bureaucracy, striking out on your own under the cover of night to bring real justice to Gotham.” He shrugged, then conceded, “Maybe I watched too many cop movies growing up.”

This was one of the more popular theories in the Reddit conspiracy threads. _Batman is a cop. Batman is a computer genius who used to work for CYBERCOM / the NSA / the CIA. Batman is Commissioner Gordon._ Never _Batman is Bruce Wayne._ Bruce made sure of that.

Something about Superman sharing his amateurish theory tickled Bruce’s competitive streak. (Looking back, he realized Superman had probably done that on purpose.) Was that the best Superman could do? Well, he could do one better.

“You grew up somewhere rural,” Bruce said dispassionately, with the confidence of a man who was never wrong. “You’re single. No kids. Boring office job. Accounting, maybe, or sales. You’re probably friends with all your coworkers.” He added, only a little bitterly, “You’re probably friends with everyone you meet.”

That was the trouble with Superman: He was impossible not to like. Bruce had tried. But despite all his efforts to maintain a chilly distance between them, his working relationship with Superman had transformed, over their first few years of knowing each other, from open hostility to regular cooperation. At first, he’d simply had to recognize that there were some situations in which two heads were better than one, or in which Superman’s frankly excessive array of superpowers was… useful. But before long, it became more than that. Much more.

It happened gradually, so gradually that by the time Bruce realized what was going on, it was too late to do anything about it. He started looking forward to their collaborations. Their conversations shifted from constant arguments to something approaching banter, even bordering on flirtation. Bruce was smiling more than he used to, laughing occasionally.

Superman’s friendship snuck up on Bruce, eroding the walls he’d put up around himself like the relentless waves of the ocean. He was irresistibly charming, and endlessly accommodating, and even Bruce would later have to admit to himself that he hadn’t stood a fucking chance.

If it was going to be anyone, Bruce should have known it would be Superman.

“See?” Superman said, looking smug about getting Bruce to open up and share his theories. “I knew you had ideas.” He paused, thought for a moment, then added another of his own: “I bet you’re one of those people who guesses how the movie’s going to end and ruins it for everyone else.” A second thoughtful pause, then, “I bet you were that kid in school who never studied but still got straight A’s.”

“You’re an Eagle Scout,” Bruce countered, “And you never had a rebellious teenage phase.”

Superman laughed, which was how Bruce knew he’d gotten that second one right on the nose. “You definitely did,” Superman retorted. “You probably learned how to be so stealthy by sneaking out of your parents’ house every night.”

The mention of his parents was exactly what Bruce needed to snap him back to reality, and out of this fantasy world where he and Superman talked about their secret identities like they might one day actually reveal them to each other. “None of this matters,” he growled, aware that he’d caught Superman off guard with his abrupt switch in demeanor, ignoring that hurt little expression Superman always got when Bruce rebuffed his attempts at breaking the thick layer of ice between them. “Anything that’s not mission-critical, I don’t need to know. It’s better for both of us that way.” He huffed a sigh, added under his breath, “Keeps things from getting complicated.”

Superman turned away, appearing to study the street more than twenty stories below, the yellow taxis crawling through traffic, the throngs of pedestrians crowding the sidewalks and jaywalking across the streets. “Right,” he said, with a little chuckle like he was telling an inside joke. “A little late for that.”

“What is that supposed to mean?”

Superman looked up, confusion plain on his features. “You don’t know?” he said, almost sounding amused. “All these things you’ve deduced about me – you got some of them right, by the way, I’ll give you that – and you don’t know?”

“What don’t I know?”

“I guess it doesn’t matter. It’s not mission-critical.”

Not one to appreciate having his own words used against him, Bruce scowled.

Bruce would never admit it, but Superman had been right when he’d said it was too late for things not to be complicated between them. Master of denial though he may have been, not even Bruce could go on forever without realizing what he’d gotten himself into with the Man of Steel. He _cared_ about Superman. Bruce actually gave a shit whether Superman lived or died, and not just because the world needed Superman, but because he could no longer imagine his own life without Superman in it. And wasn’t that a terrifying thought. Wasn’t that exactly the sort of vulnerability Bruce had been trying to avoid.

Under any other circumstances, this would have been an easy problem to fix. Bruce Wayne was practiced at disentangling himself from inconvenient attachments: an oversharing colleague, a one-night stand with expectations of a lasting relationship. But he couldn’t just avoid Superman. Sooner or later, a threat would arise that neither of them could face on their own, and they’d have to work together. So Bruce had defaulted to his backup attachment avoidance strategy: emotional repression. Pretend he hadn’t started caring. Act like nothing had changed. Simple. Easy. He’d done it a thousand times.

Until Superman decided to throw a wrench in the works and ruin everything for both of them.

“What makes you think I’m single?” he asked, and Bruce looked at him like he’d grown a second head, but answered nonetheless.

“What I meant is you’re clearly not in a long-term relationship,” Bruce clarified. “If you were, you’d probably try at least a little harder not to die.”

Superman nodded, taking Bruce’s point. “I am,” he added after a long stretch of silence, meeting Bruce’s eyes. “Single.”

Bruce balked.

Now, Bruce Wayne was hardly the master of all social situations, but this was one area where he had plenty of experience. He knew how to recognize when someone was attracted to him. You didn’t have as many successful one-night stands as he had without learning to interpret those signs. He simply hadn’t expected to pick up those signs from _Superman_. The allusion to something “complicated,” the reassurance that he was single, and that intense look in his eyes. It all added up to something dangerous. Bruce felt, all at once, like this part of his life that he’d built such careful walls around to keep it contained was spinning out of control, and he didn’t know how to put everything back into the Pandora’s box Superman had unwittingly opened.

Superman was attracted to him. If Bruce were anyone else, this would have been incredibly convenient, because goddamn, was Bruce just as attracted to him. And he didn’t want to put together the attraction he’d experienced from day one and the inconvenient feelings he’d developed over time, because that would force him to acknowledge that what he felt for Superman was more than just friendship.

Instead of counting himself lucky that his feelings were apparently requited, Bruce glared like Superman had just mortally offended him. “Is that an invitation? Did you not hear what I just said about keeping things from getting complicated?” He ignored the cauldron of emotions this sudden realization had stirred within him and focused only on his anger. He was angry at himself, for feeling the way he did. He was angry at Superman, for causing those feelings. Anger, he’d always found, was easier to feel than whatever the alternative was.

“I thought you knew,” Superman said, like he hadn’t just turned Bruce’s world upside down. “You are the World’s Greatest Detective.”

Bruce chose to ignore Superman’s insinuation that he’d failed to pick up on some obvious hints, whatever those might have been. Maybe he had, but the point was that he hadn’t been _looking_ for hints of that nature from _Superman_ . “You don’t even know what I look like,” he instead pointed out. “You don’t know how old I am. You don’t know my _name_.”

“If you’re not interested, you’re not interested. I can handle rejection. Unless you _are_ interested, but you’re convinced it would be too ‘complicated.’”

Bruce hadn’t stopped glaring, and Superman hadn’t stopped staring him down. It was only then that Bruce noticed how close they were. Normally, Bruce’s personal space was inviolable, but over the years Superman had broken down each and every one of his barriers; it was no surprise that he’d crept past this one as well. It would take so little effort for one of them to lean forward, a voice in the back of Bruce’s mind provided treacherously, to close the meager distance between them, toss their reservations out the window, and surrender to the possibility of the heat and frisson that hung in the air between them.

“I’m not interested,” Bruce said immediately. A lie. It didn’t matter, because what he said next was the truth. “It would be too complicated. And I’m not talking about this with you anymore.”

“Got it. I won’t mention it again.” Superman smiled like it was no skin off his back, and Bruce almost felt a little guilty, but what the fuck else was he supposed to do in this situation? His relationship with Superman had already progressed farther than he’d ever intended. It didn’t matter what either of them felt or what they wanted. Nothing could happen between them. And it wouldn’t. Bruce wouldn’t let it.


	2. Chapter 2

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I’m blown away by the response the first chapter got. Now I’m stoked to tell the rest of this story. Let’s get right to it!
> 
> I call this chapter “Bruce Wayne’s Unhealthy Coping Mechanisms.”

This wasn’t the first time Bruce had developed feelings for someone, although the situation had never been quite this dire. He had an established routine for getting over it and moving on. It was a simple routine, too. It basically consisted of sleeping with as many near-strangers as it took to forget he’d ever had feelings in the first place.

It had worked so far. There was no reason it couldn’t work now.

He didn’t start right away. After he returned from Superman’s revelation on the rooftop in Metropolis, Bruce spent the evening alone, nursing a glass of whiskey and ignoring Alfred’s attempts to start a conversation. He couldn’t drink enough to put himself in a better mood; he had to patrol the city later, and he needed to stay alert. Sometimes he thought being Batman was the only reason he hadn’t descended into alcoholism. Sometimes he wondered if that was why Alfred entertained his vigilantism.

The morning came and went and Bruce didn’t get out of bed until well past noon. When he checked the date on his phone, it finally registered that the previous day had been Valentine’s Day. That was good. That meant it was currently the day after Valentine’s Day. Bruce had always found this to be one of the easiest nights of the year to get laid. He went out to one of his favorite bars and was barely into his first drink before he was going home with a PhD student from Gotham U. PhD students were always a fair bet; most of them were too busy to want anything approaching a real relationship.

The next night, Bruce texted an old fling, an heiress who’d only gotten married to get her parents off her back so she could continue sleeping with whoever she wanted, whenever she wanted. (It was, obviously, an open relationship: The heiress got the appearance of being tied down without losing any of the perks of being single, and her husband married into one of the richest families in Gotham, a win-win scenario. Bruce’s sex life may have been enough to inspire plenty of pearl-clutching among the more traditional sorts, but he was no homewrecker.) They met discreetly at a hotel room and Bruce forgot about Superman for a good hour and a half that night.

He went on like this for a few weeks, with a new conquest every night he could manage it. A gym rat who wasn’t as fit as Superman, but who was close enough that Bruce could close his eyes and pretend. A couple he’d hooked up with a few times before who were always open to a third and liked that he never asked for anything more than sex. A woman from the DA’s office who tied him up and then made him wait while she took a call. A guy who wouldn’t stop commenting on how hot he thought Bruce’s scars were and a woman with a posh accent who just so happened to be from the same town as Alfred; she was the only one of Bruce’s one-night stands to insist on staying for breakfast (a full English, of course), during which she and Alfred ignored him in favor of bonding over local in-jokes.

The tabloids were having a field day keeping up with all this juicy gossip. It was excellent for Bruce’s cover. Of course Bruce Wayne couldn’t be Batman; how could he possibly have time to keep Gotham safe when he spent every night in someone else’s bed, or with someone else in his bed? But that was only half the reason Bruce had cultivated his playboy reputation. The other half? It was a good distraction. From work. From the pressure of being Batman. From feeling things.

For a while there, it seemed like Bruce’s tried-and-true method would once again do the trick. That is, until he and Superman had to team up again. Superman kept to his word and didn’t once mention the conversation they’d had on the rooftop. That wasn’t the problem. The problem came when the supervillain they were fighting broke out a surprise batch of Kryptonite and Bruce had to narrowly save Superman’s life.

When the adrenaline faded and his heart rate had slowed down to a more normal rhythm, Bruce stood in the crumbling ruins of the warehouse they’d accidentally brought down around them in the fight (at least no one was inside when it collapsed) and marveled at how truly fucked he was. The very idea of losing Superman filled him with a cold dread that slithered down his spine and settled in his gut, something fierce and protective that he didn’t quite know what to do with.

He didn’t sleep with anyone that night. He didn’t sleep at all. Instead, he lay awake, replaying that split second when he’d thought he wouldn’t get to Superman in time, the terror and panic that overwhelmed what little sense of self-preservation he had. He let it consume him, committing his considerable mental resources to solving this tangled predicament he’d gotten himself into, and by the time he stepped into the shower to get ready for the day, he had a new plan.

Sex with strangers wasn’t working because what he felt for Superman was more than simple attraction. And he’d known that, but he hadn’t been willing to accept it until now.

So he tried a different approach, and he threw himself into his work. He woke up earlier than usual – not quite as early as normal people woke, but at least closer to morning than he usually got – and went straight to the office, booked his schedule full of meetings and agreed to commitments he usually would have ignored. By the time he got home in the evenings, it was past dark, and the dinner Alfred had made him was cold. He headed out onto the dim streets of Gotham, and maybe he took more risks than he usually did, because when he returned to the Batcave Alfred had set his mouth in a thin, tight line and wouldn’t speak to him until the following day.

This plan worked spectacularly. Bruce didn’t think about Superman because he didn’t have any time to think about Superman; he kept himself busy every second of every day, he barely slept a few hours a night, he took his meals on the go and sometimes only when Alfred reminded him he hadn’t eaten all day.

There was only one minor snag, and it hit just as the weather was turning from the dreary, wet, and cold of early March to the hazy pollen-soaked onset of spring. He was exhausted, physically and mentally, and he’d underestimated the effect his lack of sleep and adequate nutrition would have on his nightly activities. He took a bad hit in a face-off with Killer Croc, barely made it home in the Batmobile before he puked on the floor of the Batcave and passed out.

He woke in his bed, stitched up and bandaged, the sun outside his windows already sinking toward the horizon. He had an email from his executive assistant letting him know she’d cleared the rest of the week and wishing him a hasty recovery; Alfred had apparently phoned to tell her that Bruce had “come down with the flu.” When he limped downstairs, he found breakfast waiting, a three-course affair with plenty of protein and something from every food group. Alfred stood a few feet away, thoroughly wiping down the already spotless kitchen counters and surreptitiously watching Bruce clear his plate. Their eyes met when Alfred took his dishes, communicating a silent ultimatum, and Bruce knew right then and there that Alfred would no longer tolerate the sort of behavior Bruce had displayed over the past few weeks.

That was how Bruce found himself still fucking thinking about Superman one evening in early April, when Alfred had finally let him return to work, on the condition that he ate and slept and rested a reasonable, healthy amount each day. He was attending his first charity gala since he’d “gotten the flu,” a boring little event in Metropolis that he couldn’t wait to get away from once he’d shaken enough hands and doled out enough insincere compliments to look like he’d at least put in an effort. The bulk of his attention was focused on finding a better solution to his Superman problem than “sleep around” and “work yourself to death.”

Maybe, he thought, he’d been on the right track when he tried distracting himself, but he’d gone about it the wrong way. Maybe, instead of one-night stands with strangers, he needed something a little more involved. Not a relationship, exactly, but something closer to a relationship than he’d ever had before. Actually putting in the work and getting to know each other and going on dates and not just having sex and then saying goodbye. Bruce had never tried doing that. At the very least it might be an entertaining challenge. And then he could cut it off once he’d sufficiently gotten over his feelings for Superman, but before the person he chose to go out with got too attached.

He’d nearly decided to give this plan – call it Plan C, since Plans A and B hadn’t done him any good – a try when, on his way out the door, something caught his eye.

Or, more accurately, some _one_.

He was tall, with well-kept dark hair, wide-rimmed glasses, and an impressive physique hiding beneath that moderately priced suit and tie. There was a resemblance, Bruce couldn’t deny it; it was the height, the build, the coloring. It all matched, more or less. And maybe it was a bad idea to immediately go after someone who reminded him of Superman, but Bruce hadn’t yet had that thought before his feet had started taking him across the room of their own accord.

Bruce came to stand behind the man. He could tell up close that the stranger was near Bruce’s age, and even more attractive than he’d seemed from a distance. He was staring intently at a particularly ugly abstract painting hanging on the wall. Bruce raised an eyebrow.

“So are you really into modern art or are you just staring at this painting so everyone assumes you’re deep in thought and doesn’t try to start a conversation with you?”

The man turned, and he must have heard Bruce approach even over the hum of conversation and the clink of champagne glasses because he didn’t look surprised to see him there. “Neither,” he said, looking Bruce up and down in a promising manner. “But that was oddly specific. Is that something you’ve done before?”

Good. He had a sense of humor. Bruce could work with that. Too many guys who looked like this one did had no personality outside of the gym. “Many times.”

“Clearly it doesn’t work very well.”

“Well, not on me. I saw through your ruse immediately.”

The man laughed, and the sound hit Bruce in the chest like a freight train. Yes, Bruce decided in that instant, this was who he was going to pursue. Hopefully he wasn’t straight. The way he looked at Bruce wasn’t very straight.

“I’m not avoiding conversation,” he said, and turned to once more face the painting. “I was actually wondering who in their right mind would hang something like this in their home, and how much money they paid for what looks like baby puke on a canvas.”

Bruce pretended to consider the question. He knew exactly how much the hosts of this party had paid for this particular piece, because they bragged about it to anyone who would listen. “I’m no connoisseur,” he said, “But I’d wager they spent at least half a million dollars on it. The Wagners wouldn’t have displayed it in such a prominent position if not to show off how expensive it was. That’s why you buy shit like this, you know: to impress your rich friends with how much you can afford to blow on baby puke. Not because you actually appreciate the artistry.”

The stranger squinted at Bruce, the humor in his expression replaced with something sharp and intelligent and discerning, and Bruce liked that very much. “That’s an awfully cynical perspective,” he observed.

“This must be your first time at one of these. Believe me, spend enough time around the wealthy and you’ll realize there’s no such thing as setting the bar too low.”

The stranger frowned, now plainly scrutinizing Bruce. He wore a look Bruce knew well, that look people got when they recognized his face but couldn’t quite pinpoint how or why. Sure enough, the stranger finally said, “You look familiar. Do I know you from somewhere?”

Bruce gave a dazzling smile, the one he knew made men and women alike go weak at the knees. “I definitely would have remembered meeting you,” he said in a silky, seductive voice, and extended his hand. “Bruce Wayne.”

A light went on in the stranger’s eyes as he shook Bruce’s hand, taking a conspicuous half-step closer to reach him. “That explains it. Clark Kent.”

Clark Kent. Bruce rolled the name around in his mind. It fit. He tipped his head toward Clark Kent’s press badge. He didn’t make a habit of sleeping with reporters, but he would make an exception for Clark Kent. “Who do you write for?”

Clark glanced down at the badge like he’d forgotten it was there. “The _Daily Planet_ ,” he said. “And you’re right; this is my first time covering an event like this. I’m usually an investigative reporter. This is my punishment for losing a huge story to the _Star_.” He shrugged in an appropriately self-effacing manner. “The boss says I’m good at writing fluff pieces, so he put me in charge of all things charity-related until he decides I’ve done my time.”

“Must’ve been some story you lost out on.”

“It was.” Clark didn’t look happy to be assigned to the charity beat. Bruce imagined it must be spectacularly dull for an investigative reporter. Hell, it was dull for Bruce, and he’d had his whole life to acclimate to it. “But I assume you go to these all the time,” Clark continued.

Now it was Bruce’s turn to look unhappy. “Far more often than I’d like,” he said. Then, as if he’d suddenly had a thought and hadn’t planned his next words from the moment he’d noticed the attractive reporter across the room, “Maybe I could give you some pointers.”

Clark smiled. It was a nice smile. Bruce thought he’d like to see it more often. “I’d appreciate that.”


	3. Chapter 3

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I am so excited that this story gives me so many opportunities to write Bruce and Clark flirting because that is literally my favorite thing to write and I haven’t done enough of it in my previous two stories (“Exclusive” had a little, but not as much as I’ve got planned for this one).

Bruce didn’t make a move that night at the charity gala. He decided he needed to do this right. He wasn’t just trying to get laid this time, which meant first, he needed to lay down some ground work. So he spent the rest of the evening telling Clark everything he knew about high society that he thought might be useful to a reporter, and Clark asked pointed questions and teased him about his cynical worldview. All the while, Bruce watched for those signs that he knew so well, and ticked them off on a list he had in his head. Clark maintained eye contact. He stood close to Bruce and leaned in regularly, ostensibly to hear him over the background noise of the gala. He laughed at things Bruce hadn’t meant to be funny and took any available excuse to brush shoulders or put a hand on his arm.

They parted ways when the event ended. Bruce wondered if Clark had been waiting for him to make his intentions clear, and if he was disappointed that Bruce hadn’t. With his reputation, the men and women Bruce pursued usually waited for him to make the first move, because they knew, if he was interested, he would. But all Bruce said was, “Have a good night,” and he couldn’t be sure if he’d imagined the brief flash of surprise on Clark’s face that was gone before Bruce could properly analyze it.

He went home. He patrolled Gotham. He went to bed just before dawn, and when he woke, he knew exactly what he was going to do.

He knew enough about Clark to know he’d run into him again. Clark was a reporter, and he was currently covering “all things charity-related.” All Bruce had to do was attend any galas he was invited to in Metropolis, which would be easy, seeing how any charity gala worth covering in the Delaware-New Jersey area would have Bruce Wayne on its invite list. Surely Clark would be at some of them. And after they’d interacted a few more times, Bruce would ask him out. If he said yes, then Bruce had found the person who would distract him from Superman. If he didn’t, Bruce would move on, and at least he would have gotten some practice flirting without the intention to have sex at the earliest available opportunity, practice he could use on the next attractive man or woman he encountered.

Just to make sure he’d made the right decision in selecting Clark, Bruce did what he’d been assured was completely normal and not creepy among people their age and Googled him. The top search results revealed Clark’s most viewed articles, the Twitter account where he promoted his work, and a lightly used Facebook account.

Bruce skimmed a few of the articles; apparently Clark frequently wrote about Superman, which wasn’t ideal, but Bruce figured any reporter in Metropolis would have to do a fair bit of writing about Superman, so Bruce wouldn’t hold it against him. Then he scrolled through Clark’s most recent tweets, which mostly consisted of his takes on controversial issues, links to articles he found interesting, and a slew of retweets from his coworkers, mostly from another investigative reporter named Lois Lane who had several thousand more followers than Clark did.

Everything online indicated Clark Kent was a friendly, well-liked, well-rounded guy. He liked his job. He was friends with his coworkers. He had informed opinions about politics and media. And most importantly, there were no signs of a significant other in the picture. There weren’t any references to his sexuality, either, other than a general support for LGBT rights, which didn’t mean much, but Bruce definitely hadn’t gotten a straight vibe from Clark at the charity gala. He decided to stick to his plan and see how things worked out. The worst that could happen was that Clark wouldn’t be interested.

Two weeks passed before Bruce next had the opportunity to go to Metropolis. The event he would be attending promised to be a dull one, but he put on a fake smile and steeled himself for a few hours of boredom in hopes of seeing Clark. Sure enough, he saw the reporter arrive not long after him. Same glasses, same dark hair, and another nearly identical department store suit and tie. His outfit wasn’t much next to the millionaires and billionaires surrounding him, but he was still easily the most attractive man in the room. Bruce made his way over.

“Your editor must really hate you if he’s making you cover this.” Even though Bruce had approached Clark from behind, Clark turned to greet him almost expectantly, not surprised in the slightest, like he’d again heard Bruce coming. Maybe he was just difficult to faze. They shook hands.

“I didn’t think you’d actually remember me,” Clark said with what looked like a genuine smile.

Bruce smiled back. Given Clark’s positive reaction to Bruce’s presence, Bruce decided to start testing the waters. He wanted to gauge Clark’s interest before sinking time and effort into pursuing him. So he turned on the charm and said, “I’d never forget a face as pretty as yours.” Instead of looking uncomfortable or taking offense – not many straight guys appreciated another man calling them “pretty” – Clark’s smile widened into a grin. That was encouraging.

A waiter passed by, and Bruce snagged a pair of champagne glasses, offering one to Clark. “Thirsty?”

“I don’t usually drink on the job.”

Bruce leaned in conspiratorially. “But that’s the only reason to come to one of these,” he stage-whispered. Clark laughed.

“That and the important charity work, right?” Clark teased.

“I could donate money from the comfort of my own home,” Bruce said with a shrug, keeping both glasses for himself. “I’m only here for the booze. And the company,” he added with a meaningful glance in Clark’s direction.

“You talk to a lot of interesting people at these?” Clark asked, feigning ignorance, though he’d taken the cue to lean in closer and didn’t even try to hide the way he watched Bruce’s mouth as Bruce took a sip of champagne.

“Only one,” Bruce answered in a low voice that forced Clark to lean in even closer. The space between them sparked with tension. Bruce was one hundred percent certain that, if he asked Clark if he wanted to take their conversation “somewhere more private,” Clark would say yes. But he wasn’t playing that game. So he switched back to a more casual tone and said, “Tell me about what you’ve been writing. Besides this charity stuff.”

Clark told him. After they’d spent their last evening together with Bruce doing most of the talking and Clark asking the questions, Bruce figured it was only fair to switch things up. Clark’s passion for his work was even more evident in person than it had been on Twitter. He went into great detail, and Bruce was more than happy to indulge him. Every new thing he learned about Clark only made him seem more and more like the perfect candidate for Bruce’s little experiment. Not only was he attractive, he was also intelligent. Bruce needed that if they were going to spend a good amount of time together; if they couldn’t hold an intellectually stimulating conversation, then what was the point? He needed someone to distract him. And Clark was very distracting.

After Clark finished regaling Bruce about everything else he was working on while he wrote fluffy charity pieces on the side, he stopped and apologized. “Sorry, I’m sure this is the most boring conversation you’ve had all week.”

“I’m not bored at all,” Bruce assured him. “But I don’t want to monopolize your time if you need to get actual work done.”

For a second, Clark looked puzzled, like he’d completely forgotten he’d even come to this event for work in the first place. Like he couldn’t remember coming here for any reason other than to talk to Bruce Wayne. Bruce repressed a satisfied smile. This was going to be even easier than he’d expected.

“Work,” Clark said, like Bruce had snapped him out of a daydream. “Right. I should probably get on that.” He paused, mouth open like he wanted to say something, and eventually settled on, “It was nice seeing you again.”

“Likewise.”

Bruce thought about going somewhere else that night, picking someone up who could show him a good time, seeing how he wasn’t yet ready to take things there with Clark, not if he wanted to spin what they had into something more than a one-night stand. But he quickly decided against it. Whoever he might be able to get in bed with him that night, it wouldn’t matter. They wouldn’t be what he wanted. At the moment, all he wanted was Clark.

He’d hoped to get the opportunity to interact with Clark again relatively soon, but the next few events Bruce attended showed no sign of him. Before he knew it, an entire month had passed. Fortunately, just when he thought he’d have to move on to different prospects, he ran into Clark for the third time.

This time, Clark was the one who got the drop on him, instead of the other way around. “Are you following me, Mr. Wayne?”

Bruce turned, not bothering to hide the smile that spread across his face. He wanted Clark to know he was happy to see him. “If only,” he said, taking Clark in. He looked much the same as the last two times Bruce had seen him, which was to say he looked incredible. “Every time I attend one of these I hope I’ll run into someone as interesting as you, but you’re hardly at any of them. I was starting to worry your boss had finally let you off the hook.”

“Actually, tonight’s supposed to be my last charity piece. Apparently I’ve redeemed myself.”

Now Bruce had a deadline. He needed to get things going with Clark, and he needed to do it that very night, or he might never see Clark again. He’d hoped to build things up a little more gradually between them, but he could adapt.

“I guess that means I’ll be seeing a lot less of you,” he said. “That’s a shame.”

“I’m sure you’ll find some other bright-eyed young journalist to ruin with your cynical perspective.”

Bruce took a purposeful step into Clark’s personal space. Clark didn’t budge, and met him with an unwavering gaze. Bruce lowered his voice so only Clark would hear him. “I’d rather ruin this one.”

“Then maybe you should ask for his phone number. Then you could make plans to spend time together, like normal people, instead of just hoping you’ll run into each other.” Clark’s voice barely rose above a whisper. He was matching Bruce’s every move, like a game of chess in its final stages, and it was exhilarating.

Bruce didn’t say anything right away, letting the silence between them fill with meaning. Then he stepped back and raised his voice, breaking the tension. “How much material do you still need for your article?”

“You got here late. I’ve already got everything I need.”

“Then what do you say we get out of here?” The question hung in the air for a split second before Bruce amended it. He wanted Clark to think he was propositioning him, only for a moment. Once Clark got the idea into his head, Bruce knew he’d have a hard time shaking it, and he’d be looking forward to it that much more when it finally happened. But it wasn’t going to happen tonight. “I haven’t eaten since lunch,” Bruce added. “You’re the Metropolis local. What’s good near here that’s open late?”

He could almost sense Clark shifting gears, from “about to get laid” to “still might get laid later, but not right away.” He almost felt bad for getting Clark’s hopes up. But it was all part of the process.

“There’s a Chinese place I know will be open,” Clark said, only a little breathlessly. He was doing a fair job of keeping up, Bruce had to give him that. “But I’m not sure how it measures up to the Bruce Wayne standard of dining.”

“I love Chinese. Let’s go.”


	4. Chapter 4

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Happy Valentine’s Day.

It was well past dark when they emerged outside onto the streets of Metropolis. Clark led the way down the street a few blocks to a Chinese restaurant sandwiched between a convenience store and a bar. It was cramped and dim inside, but the smells wafting from the kitchen were inviting, and Bruce realized abruptly that he hadn’t eaten since lunch and he was  _ starving _ .

Clark frowned at the peeling wallpaper, mismatched tables and chairs, and sticky laminated menus. He seemed to be regretting his decision to bring Bruce here. “Everything looks so much dingier when you’re with a billionaire,” he observed. Bruce rolled his eyes.

“I’m not the Queen of England. I’ve eaten at hole-in-the-wall Chinese restaurants before.”

This seemed to reassure Clark, and they found their seats in a secluded corner toward the back. Bruce scanned the menu; the restaurant offered your standard Chinese fare, and they both selected quickly and gave their orders to a middle-aged waiter who stopped by their table a few minutes after they sat down. While they waited for their food, Bruce leaned forward and examined Clark more closely than he had before. Every time Bruce looked at him, he was struck all over again by how attractive Clark was. He had nice cheekbones, a sculpted jaw, and perfect skin that spoke to an acne-free adolescence. His eyes were a stormy gray-blue behind his glasses, and his dark hair had a slight curl to it that gave him an almost boyish look.

“Tell me about yourself, Clark,” Bruce instructed.

“What do you want to know?”

“I already know you’re a journalist. Why don’t we start with that? How did you get into it?”

This was clearly a story Clark had told many times before. He launched into it with a practiced ease, saying, “English was always my favorite subject in school. I liked the reading, but I loved the writing. So I knew pretty early on that I wanted a career in writing. And I like to be at the center of the action, so journalism was a natural fit. I came to Metropolis for college and landed an internship with the  _ Daily Planet _ . They hired me as soon as I graduated.” Clark paused while the waiter set their drinks in front of them, identical glasses of ice water. “What about you? I mean, I know you work for your family’s company, but is that what you always wanted to do?”

“Not always,” Bruce admitted. “When I was younger, I actually wanted to be a detective.”

Clark nodded. “I had a few phases like that, when I wanted to be something cool and exciting. A firefighter or an astronaut. What made you change your mind?”

“You grow up,” Bruce said with a shrug. “You get boring. You start making practical decisions about your future. Happens to the best of us.” That was part of the truth. He wasn’t going to share the rest of it, the complicated feelings of guilt and obligation to his deceased parents, the ceaseless drive to uphold their legacy. It wasn’t exactly first date material.

“It does,” Clark agreed with a wry smile.

Their food arrived, and they dug in. Between bites, Bruce asked, “Are you from Metropolis originally?” He got the feeling that Clark was a transplant. He didn’t have the Metropolis attitude.

“No,” Clark said, confirming Bruce’s suspicions. “I’m from Kansas. Small town. I literally grew up on a farm.”

Bruce entertained a vivid picture of Clark in a plaid work shirt, sleeves rolled up in the sun, dirty jeans cuffed at the ankles over a pair of worn work boots. It was a nice image. “Any siblings?”

“Just me. I would’ve loved a brother or sister, but my parents had their hands full with me.”

“What made you decide to leave?”

“Like I said, I decided to study journalism because I wanted to be at the center of the action. Not much action in Smallville, Kansas.”

“The center of the action,” Bruce repeated. “So writing about boring charity galas must have been your worst nightmare.”

Clark met his gaze over a long sip from his water glass. “It wasn’t as bad as I thought it would be,” he said, eyes sparkling with intention. Bruce’s eyes flicked to Clark’s mouth, trailed down the exposed line of his throat. Clark took off his suit jacket and draped it over the back of his chair. The fabric of his shirt stretched over the muscles in his torso. What Bruce wouldn’t give to see what they looked like underneath.

“What about you?” Clark asked, redirecting Bruce’s attention back to their conversation. “Your family’s been in Gotham for generations. Ever thought about leaving?”

“Not really,” Bruce answered truthfully. Leave Gotham? He’d sooner quit being Batman. They basically amounted to the same thing. He then joked, “Selling the house would be a nightmare, first of all.”

“Do you have a vacation home or something? I know that’s a rich person thing.”

“It is a rich person thing.” Bruce chuckled at Clark’s phrasing. “I think I’m the only billionaire I know who doesn’t. Most have several. But I don’t go on vacation often enough to justify it.”

“Really?” Clark seemed surprised. “You’re not jetting off to Saint-Tropez and Ibiza and Santorini every other weekend?” At Bruce’s raised eyebrow, Clark continued. “I guess I get most of my ideas of what rich people do from the internet.”

“I travel, sure, but mostly for work,” Bruce told him. “I’m in China a lot. India. Brussels. And I spend most of my time there in a boardroom. But you’re a journalist. You must know what it’s like to travel for work.”

“Actually, my coworker gets most of the international assignments,” Clark confessed. “Lois Lane. She’s the  _ Daily Planet _ ’s top investigative reporter, and I’m not too proud to admit it.” He took a bite of his noodles. “Let’s not talk about work anymore. I talk about work every day of my life. What do you do in your free time?”

Bruce didn’t even know how to answer that. “To be honest, I don’t have much free time,” he said. That was as close to the truth as he could offer.

“Ah,” Clark said. “A fellow workaholic.” He reached into his pocket and took out his phone, swiping and tapping and then reading something off the screen. “Well, according to the internet, you’ve got all kinds of crazy hobbies.”

“According to the internet, I do nothing but attend orgies every weekend.”

Clark looked at Bruce over his phone, amused. “You don’t?”

“Not every weekend,” he said wryly. Bruce then thought about what else was out there about him on the internet. He’d done more than just sleep around to cultivate his public persona. He’d also needed to come up with an excuse for frequently sustaining somewhat serious injuries, an excuse that fit the Bruce Wayne lifestyle and wouldn’t raise any suspicions. It had been Alfred’s idea, and so far, it had worked spectacularly. “Sure,” he said to Clark, thinking about the completely fabricated “Personal Life” section on his Wikipedia page. “I’ve dabbled in some… unconventional hobbies.”

“Rock climbing,” Clark read off his phone. Yep. He was on Bruce’s Wikipedia page. Bruce knew it well. He’d written it himself. “That’s not too out of the ordinary. Skydiving. Mountain biking. Whitewater kayaking. Mixed martial arts. ‘Extreme skiing’? What the hell is ‘extreme skiing’?”

“Exactly what it sounds like.”

Clark set the phone down and grinned. “So you’re a workaholic  _ and _ an adrenaline junkie. That’s a dangerous combination.”

“That’s what my butler tells me.”

Clark raised his eyebrows, then burst out laughing. “You did  _ not _ just say that.”

“I try not to sound like an out-of-touch rich person—” Bruce began before Clark interrupted him.

“Do you?”

He thought about that. “No.” Clark laughed again. Bruce couldn’t help but smile. Clark had a nice, honest laugh, the infectious kind that spread through a room like wildfire until everyone was in on the joke. Bruce liked it. A lot. “Tell me about  _ your _ hobbies, then, if mine are so strange,” he said.

“I like to go out drinking with my coworkers. I like to stay home and watch Netflix.” Clark held out his hands. “I am a very typical Millennial.”

“You’re boring me to tears,” Bruce teased.

Clark looked down at his half-empty plate, took another bite, then washed it down with another sip of water. “Maybe that’s why I’m here with you tonight.” He looked up again, caught Bruce’s gaze like a fishing line and reeled him in. “I need a little excitement in my life.”

“I assumed you just wanted a free meal.”

“That too.”

They finished eating and Bruce took the check. Clark seemed like the chivalrous type who would offer to pay in any other situation, but they both knew how ridiculous that would be, what with Bruce being who he was. So Bruce paid, and they stepped out into the light of the streetlamps and the cool night air of late spring. They stood together on the sidewalk for a minute, saying nothing, Clark’s jacket draped over his shoulder and his tie loose. He had an expectant look in his eyes, and Bruce knew exactly what that meant, but he’d already decided to draw this thing out between them, and taking Clark home after their first date was the opposite of “drawing it out.”

So Bruce said, “I should get back to Gotham,” and he ignored the slightly put-out expression on Clark’s face that was gone in a flash once Clark remembered himself.

“Did you drive here? I’ll walk you to your car.”

“I don’t want you to go out of your way.”

“It’s not out of my way,” Clark insisted, even though Bruce hadn’t yet told him where he’d parked.

They walked back in the direction of the event venue, in silence at first, before Clark started talking. “Okay, you mentioned having a butler,” he said curiously. “I’m dying to know what that’s like. Do you have a cook, too? A maid? Is your life like  _ Downton Abbey _ ?”

Bruce didn’t know what the hell  _ Downton Abbey _ was, so he ignored that part of the question and said, “I just have the butler. He’s been with my family since before I was born. He was my legal guardian.”  _ After my parents died, _ he didn’t add, but they both knew. Bruce was sure Clark had looked him up, the same as Bruce had done, and if he hadn’t already known that Bruce Wayne was famously orphaned as a child, surely he knew by now.

“Is he British?” Clark asked.

“Of course.”

“Of course.” Clark laughed, a sound Bruce was rapidly becoming addicted to. “Why even have a butler if he’s not British? What’s his name?”

“Alfred.”

Clark nodded approvingly. “Very British.”

They reached Bruce’s car, parked on the street outside the venue. Bruce could tell just from the way Clark glanced uncaringly at Bruce’s shiny black Aston Martin that he wasn’t a car guy. “Thanks for dinner,” Clark said.

“Thanks for joining me.” Bruce popped the door open and stood just outside it, giving Clark one last, long look before moving to get in.

“Aren’t you forgetting something?” Clark asked. When Bruce turned back to him, he had that mischievous look in his eyes from earlier. Bruce observed him, his interest piqued.

“Am I?”

“We have no way of contacting each other,” Clark reminded him. “I already tried finding you on Facebook and Twitter.”

“I’m not on social media.”

Clark shook his head like a disapproving teacher. “You’re a disgrace to our generation.” Then he held out his hand. “Let me give you my phone number.”

Bruce unlocked his phone, opened a new contact, and handed it over to Clark, who quickly tapped in his information and then offered the phone back. As Bruce reached out to take it, Clark stepped into his space and, with his free hand, grabbed Bruce by the lapel and brought their mouths together.

The kiss was sudden and unexpected, but Bruce caught up quickly, his experience taking over for him. He pocketed his phone and then hooked the fingers of both hands through Clark’s belt loops, dragging him nearer until their bodies were pressed flush against each other. He felt Clark smile and heard him drop his jacket on the asphalt beneath them so he could get his hands on Bruce, one firm on the small of his back, the other behind his head to coax him into the right angle to deepen the kiss. Bruce parted his lips and Clark’s tongue delved into his mouth eagerly.

Bruce could have gone on like that for hours. He could have instructed Clark to get in the passenger seat and whisked him away to Gotham, or asked for directions to his apartment. He very much wanted to do any of those things. But he’d made a plan, and not even Clark’s mouth against his could convince him to diverge from that plan. He extricated himself gradually, drinking in the sight of Clark looking like he might let Bruce take him right there on the hood of his car if Bruce wanted to. He did kind of want to.

“I really do need to get home,” he said by way of apology while Clark slowly regained his composure.

“Sure,” Clark said, a bit hoarsely. “I guess I’ll see you later.”

“You will,” Bruce promised. He gave a genuine smile and then got into his car and drove away.

Only when Bruce returned from his patrol in the pre-dawn hours of morning did he realize that he’d gone the entire night without thinking about Superman.


	5. Chapter 5

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Turns out this story is going to be a little steamier than my previous stories. Not explicit, but, y’know, allusions to sex, some (again, non-explicit) foreplay. If that’s not your thing, stop reading now.
> 
> Okay, you’ve been warned. The rest of you, enjoy the chapter.

iMessage  
Sat, May 23, 4:46 PM

BRUCE WAYNE: I’ve just found out what Downton Abbey is.  
CLARK KENT: Who is this?  
BRUCE WAYNE: Bruce Wayne. You mentioned Downton Abbey last night. I had to Google it.  
CLARK KENT: Oh my God.  
BRUCE WAYNE: My life is not like that, FYI.  
CLARK KENT: Did you watch it?  
BRUCE WAYNE: Only 30 minutes. Not really my thing.  
CLARK KENT: Yeah, you seem like more of a Breaking Bad kind of guy.  
BRUCE WAYNE: Actually, I don’t really watch TV.  
CLARK KENT: No social media AND no TV? I can’t believe I went on a date with you.  
BRUCE WAYNE: Is that a no to a second date then?  
CLARK KENT: I didn’t say that.  
BRUCE WAYNE: I have to warn you, I have a pretty busy schedule.  
CLARK KENT: You and me both.  
BRUCE WAYNE: I can let you know the next time I’m in Metropolis.  
CLARK KENT: That works.

They made plans to go out again one Friday when Bruce was in Metropolis for business. All week leading up to what would be their second date, Bruce found himself looking forward to it, more than he thought he would. Clark was good company, and outside of Alfred, Bruce didn’t have much of that in his life.

Speaking of Alfred, Bruce hadn’t told him anything about the plan he’d come up with to distract himself from Superman. He hadn’t told him about his feelings for Superman in the first place, and he certainly hadn’t told him about his date with Clark. This wasn’t unusual; although he kept Alfred in the loop on his crime-fighting activities, Bruce mostly kept the details of his personal life to himself, half because he didn’t have much of a personal life to speak of and half because he suspected what details he did have to share would only make Alfred more worried about him. Alfred had interacted with a handful of Bruce’s one-night stands, the ones who stayed for breakfast or got lost in the halls of Wayne Manor in the dark and needed directions to the front door, and that was the extent of it.

Besides, after living with Alfred for so many years, Bruce didn’t need to tell him anything to know what he would say. Alfred’s accented voice had taken up permanent residence in Bruce’s brain, and it piped up, annoyingly, whenever Bruce was about to make an unwise or unhealthy decision. Weirdly enough, the voice didn’t have much to say as Bruce got in his car to drive across Metropolis and meet Clark for dinner. Bruce supposed Alfred would probably be pleased he was interacting with another human being his age without the sole intention of having sex, even if Bruce’s reasons for doing so were dubious at best. Clark actually seemed exactly like the type of person Alfred would approve of: polite, intelligent, gainfully employed.

Bruce plugged the address Clark had texted him into Google Maps and shifted into drive. It was a sushi place in a trendy neighborhood along the bay. He found parking on the street a few blocks away, left his suit jacket in the car. It was a warm night, early June, and he didn’t want to look overly like he’d just come straight from a meeting, even if that was exactly what he’d done.

He walked in the direction of the sushi restaurant. As soon as it came into view, he frowned and pulled out his phone to check that he was in the right place. He was, but the building in front of him looked nothing like the pictures on Google Maps. The restaurant’s sign had been taken down, leaving a faded imprint behind. The lights were off, and a large sign in the window advertised that the building was available to lease.

Just as Bruce was about to text Clark to ask if he’d known this place had shut down, he turned and saw the man himself walking down the street toward him. Clark looked like he’d also come straight from work, dressed in a button-up shirt and slacks. He raised a hand in a friendly wave, and there was no mistaking his brilliant grin even from half a block away.

“Hey,” Clark called out as he got closer.

Bruce nodded toward the boarded-up restaurant. “Hey,” he said in greeting, then, “This place looks closed.”

“It does, doesn’t it?” Clark replied, barely glancing at the restaurant. He didn’t sound overly concerned, or even surprised. “That’s so weird. I pass here every day on my way to work. You’d think I’d have noticed.”

Bruce pointed at a different restaurant across the street, one that was obviously open. “Ever eaten there?”

“Where?” Clark followed Bruce’s gaze, then shook his head. “Oh, that place’ll be packed this time of night. We’ll never get in without a reservation.”

True, the outdoor seating was full, and there were people loitering outside with those buzzers in their hands, waiting to be seated, but Bruce was hardly deterred. “I can usually get in wherever I want without a reservation,” he said with a smug look in Clark’s direction. Clark rolled his eyes.

“I’m not using your celebrity status to cut in line,” he said firmly. Figured he’d be the type of guy whose morals didn’t allow him to take advantage of the perks of dating a billionaire. It was refreshing, actually; most of the people Bruce attracted were the opposite, buzzing around him like flies desperate for a drop of residual fame or fortune. But then again, if he’d thought Clark was a gold digger, he wouldn’t have given him the time of day in the first place.

“I just went grocery shopping yesterday,” Clark continued. “We can eat at my place.”

“It’s not far?” Bruce asked.

“Just down the block.” Clark tilted his head in the direction, Bruce assumed, of his apartment building. Bruce shrugged and followed him, and as they walked side by side, a suspicion burrowed itself in Bruce’s mind, something he filed away for later.

They arrived at Clark’s building. Clark buzzed them in, led Bruce to the elevators that took them up to the fourth floor. They arrived in front of apartment 419, and Clark unlocked the door and made a sweeping gesture for Bruce to go inside.

Bruce hadn’t given that much thought to what Clark’s apartment would look like, but if he had, he would have imagined it more or less exactly like this. It was a neat little one bedroom, with an updated kitchen and a living area with enough room for a few guests to sit and talk or watch TV. Three closed doors led to what Bruce assumed were the bedroom, the bathroom, and either a hall closet or a washer and dryer. There was minimal decoration, but it still looked lived in, cozy.

“It’s no Wayne Manor,” Clark said, watching Bruce for his reaction, “But it’s within walking distance of the office, and my neighbors are quiet.”

“It’s nice,” Bruce said, because he wasn’t sure what else he could say that wouldn’t sound disingenuous coming from a man who kept an apartment larger than this just to bring his one-night stands to when he didn’t feel like driving them all the way to Wayne Manor.

Clark sat him down in the kitchen and opened the fridge. “Any dietary restrictions I should know about?” he asked over his shoulder.

“None.”

Clark whipped up a relatively quick meal of spaghetti and vegetables, chatting to Bruce the whole time. They kept the conversation light, talked about work, mostly. Clark batted away Bruce’s efforts to help out – he was a shitty cook, but Alfred had always made him set the table and wash the dishes, told him it would keep him from growing up too spoiled – and, when he was finished, laid the food out on the kitchen table and held a few different bottles of ice-cold beer in front of Bruce, all from local craft breweries. “Take your pick.”

Bruce selected one, and Clark popped the top off and poured it into a glass for him. Then he sat down across from Bruce with his own bottle. “Dig in.”

Bruce didn’t need telling twice. Their conversation fizzled into silence while they ate, and Bruce returned to the suspicion he’d developed earlier, a suspicion that had only grown as the date had progressed. Finally, after they’d washed down their last bites with swigs of beer but before Clark could clear away their dirty dishes, Bruce leaned forward on the table and smirked.

“You planned this,” he said. It was a statement, not a question.

Clark met his gaze steadily.  “I don’t know what you’re talking about,” he replied, but the gleam in his eyes gave him away.

“You mean to tell me you didn’t orchestrate this entire evening to get me into your apartment?”

Now Clark was grinning. He had perfect teeth to match his perfect skin. It was an appearance most people would have to pay tens of thousands of dollars to obtain, but on Clark, it looked perfectly natural. “What if I did?”

Bruce leaned back in his chair, still smirking. “If you did, I’d say I underestimated you.” He paused just long enough for his next words to sink in. “I don’t often underestimate people.”

Silence stretched between them before Clark broke it abruptly, standing and taking their dishes. “I got tired of waiting,” he admitted, rinsing their plates and forks and knives off in the sink. “I realize it’s technically only our second date, but I expected you to make a move the first night we met. You’re  _ Bruce Wayne _ .”

That was fair. “I wouldn’t want you to think I only wanted you for sex,” Bruce lied, following Clark to the sink and helping him load the dishwasher. He couldn’t tell Clark the truth, that he was drawing things out so he could distract himself as long as possible. He worried if they moved things along too quickly, he would get bored, and he’d have to break things off before he’d properly gotten over Superman. Although, given how little he’d thought about Superman between their first and second dates, Bruce was beginning to think his feelings for his superhero colleague hadn’t been as serious as he’d thought they were. Maybe he’d gotten worked up for nothing. Maybe it had only been a passing infatuation that, in his paranoia, he’d built up in his mind to be something more than it was. Maybe he was already over it.

“Sure,” Clark said, turning to face Bruce, “But you do  _ partially _ want me for sex, right?” He had a cheeky grin on his face and the sleeves of his shirt were rolled up to reveal his toned forearms. They were standing close. Clark dried his hands off on a dishtowel and then handed it to Bruce so he could do the same.

Bruce had planned to wait at least one more date before taking things to the bedroom – that was when people usually had sex, on the third date, right? – but if Clark was  _ asking _ for it…

That was Bruce’s last rational thought before he dragged Clark toward him and brought their mouths together for a downright filthy kiss. No teasing, no dancing around it, nothing but straightforward intention and unconcealed lust. Clark joined right in, humming into Bruce’s mouth as their tongues slid together, steadying himself with one hand on the kitchen counter, the other hovering in the air between them, like he couldn’t decide where he wanted to touch Bruce first, before settling on Bruce’s waist.

Bruce wasn’t going to waste time. The first time, in his experience, was never the time to try to draw it out. That came later, once you’d gotten to know the other person, what they liked, what their rhythm was. He made quick work of Clark’s shirt, and Clark got with the program immediately, disrobing Bruce with only slightly less finesse. Bruce broke the kiss just long enough to get a good look at Clark shirtless; it was everything Bruce had imagined and more, a body to make a Greek god jealous. Clark was apparently in a similar headspace as he ran his hands up and down Bruce’s torso, eyes dark, biting his lip slightly.

As Clark’s hands found Bruce’s belt, Bruce pulled him close again, kissing him first on the mouth, then trailing his mouth along Clark’s sculpted jaw, down his neck. Clark fumbled in getting Bruce’s belt off, unbuttoning and unzipping his pants.

He froze with his hand just inches from where Bruce wanted it to be.

“Shit.”

Bruce withdrew instantly. “What?” he asked.

“I completely forgot… Bruce, I’m so sorry, but I have to go.”

It took a second for Clark’s words to get past the cloudy barrier of arousal that fogged Bruce’s mind. “Where do you have to go?” he asked.

Clark just shook his head, already picking his shirt up off the floor and buttoning it back up. He grabbed his keys off a hook by the front door. Bruce followed, shirt in hand, because even if he didn’t fully understand what was going on, he knew when it was his cue to leave.

“I’ll text you,” Clark said, shutting and locking the door behind him. “I’m  _ really _ sorry. Can you let yourself out?”

Clark was already halfway down the hall toward the elevator by the time Bruce answered, “Sure.”

“I’ll see you soon,” Clark called over his shoulder. “I promise.”

It took almost a full minute for Bruce to get his bearings. He’d been turned down before, sure. He’d had partners decide, midway through foreplay, that they weren’t into it, actually, and that was fine. But that didn’t seem to be what was going on here.

Bruce wasn’t sure  _ what _ was going on here.

Clark had just… ditched him, with zero explanation, right as things were about to get interesting. It was so unexpected and bizarre that Bruce couldn’t even find it in himself to be upset about it. Instead, he put his shirt back on, took the elevator down to the lobby, and walked past the boarded-up sushi restaurant to his car.

He got a news notification on his phone halfway to Gotham.  _ BREAKING: Superman Saves Multiple Families From Gas Explosion _ . Bruce glanced at it, then swiped to dismiss it. He accelerated toward home.


	6. Chapter 6

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Sorry it took me so long to get this one up. Work is a bitch.
> 
> You guys have a lot of very different theories as to how you think this story is going to go. Some of you are onto something. Some of you aren’t. Guess you’ll just have to keep reading to find out.

By the time Bruce woke up the next day – it being a Saturday, he was free to sleep in even more than usual – he already had four texts from Clark. The first had come around 8:00 A.M., which Bruce thought was an insane time for a person to be awake on a weekend, and read:  _ I am so sorry about what happened last night. I completely forgot about a really important deadline and had to go back to the office. I can’t afford to screw up at work. You know I only just got back in my boss’ good graces. _ And then, a few minutes later:  _ I know it’s no excuse. I just want you to know I didn’t blow you off for no reason. _

So Clark’s abrupt exit the previous night had been a work emergency. Bruce didn’t know the first thing about how newsrooms operated, but it did seem like the type of job where meeting deadlines was even more important than usual. He was surprised, though, because Clark hadn’t struck him as the flaky type who would forget about a deadline until the last minute. But then again, Bruce didn’t really know him that well. Maybe Clark had a hidden forgetful streak.

Clark had sent the third text around noon:  _ I hope we can see each other again sometime soon. _ And then the fourth, again only a few minutes after:  _ I’m going to stop texting you now because I realize I’m starting to look desperate. Text me back when you get the chance. _

Bruce chuckled to himself and decided to put Clark out of his misery. He dialed Clark’s number and waited for him to pick up.

The phone rang three times, and then, “Hey. I thought I chased you off with my flakiness and quadruple-texting.”

“What the hell is quadruple-texting?” Bruce asked. He was sitting at his desk in his study, and he swiveled his desk chair to look out the window while he spoke. It was a beautiful day outside, sunny and bright, not a cloud in the sky.

“You know,” Clark said, “Like double-texting.”

“Which is…?”

Clark’s laugh was just as infectious over the phone. “Have I mentioned you’re a terrible Millennial?”

“You have. What is double-texting?”

“When you text someone again before they text you back,” Clark explained. “It’s considered clingy.”

Bruce rolled his eyes, even though Clark wasn’t there to see it. He’d never been a fan of pointless social rules. “I know clingy,” he said. “You’re not clingy. Did you meet your deadline?”

“Barely,” Clark said. “Again, really sorry about that.”

“It’s fine. Really,” Bruce replied. Far be it from him, a billionaire who’d inherited the bulk of his wealth from his parents and technically had never needed to work a day in his life, to judge someone who hadn’t been born with that privilege, and who needed to work to pay the bills and put food on the table. Of course Clark would prioritize his job over a man he’d only been on two dates with. Bruce wouldn’t expect anything else. As long as Clark running off with no explanation didn’t become a regular thing, Bruce didn’t see a problem. “And I’d love to see you again. How about next weekend?”

“Hold on, let me check,” Clark said. The line was briefly silent before Clark continued, “My Saturday night is free. And I don’t mind coming up to Gotham, if it’s more convenient.”

“Do you own a car?”

“I can take the train.”

“I’ll come to you.” Bruce liked driving. It helped him clear his head. And on a Saturday, there wouldn’t be any annoying rush hour traffic. “Where should I meet you?”

“My apartment? I’ll make dinner again. Call it ‘take two’ of last night’s date.”

“What time should I be there?”

“Seven?” Clark suggested.

“Seven,” Bruce agreed.

They said their goodbyes and hung up.

It was just Bruce’s luck that he had to team up with Superman again in between his second and third dates with Clark. It had been months since their last team-up, and now here they were, just as Bruce’s master plan to get over Superman was starting to really get somewhere.

At least Superman had backed off a little since confessing his feelings. The flirting between them had died down; their interaction, in general, had tapered off. They spoke to each other only to communicate something vital about their mission. Occasionally one of them forgot himself and made an inside joke, and then the other forgot himself and laughed at it, but they would shortly thereafter remember that they weren’t doing that anymore and they’d both clam up.

It was, in short, incredibly awkward. At first, Bruce appreciated the shift in their relationship, thinking it would make it easier to view Superman in a strictly professional light. It wasn’t easier. It was like walking on eggshells. Every word or glance that passed between them was a reminder of what they were deliberately ignoring. If anything, it only made Bruce  _ more _ aware of the feelings he was hiding. It only made those feelings more difficult to keep locked away, where not even he could access them.

Superman was the one who brought it up, because of course he was. Bruce was not the type to start conversations about his feelings. Superman very much was. “This isn’t working,” he said. Bruce opened his mouth to ask what he was referring to, even though they both knew – even though it was all either of them could think about – before Superman interrupted him. “I know you know what I’m talking about,” he continued, preempting Bruce’s question. He gave an apologetic half-smile. “It’s my fault. I shouldn’t have said anything. I knew it was a bad idea at the time. I don’t know why I did it. But can we just try to forget about it? We’re both adults here. Even though we haven’t been acting like it.”

He had a point, and even Bruce had to admit it. They hadn’t been acting very maturely. Bruce could breeze through an interaction with one of his ex-flings without a hint of awkwardness, but for some reason, he couldn’t handle being around Superman after Superman had admitted to having feelings for him.

But Bruce had never felt for those one night stands what he felt for Superman. He hadn’t fought side-by-side with them, saved them from certain death, trusted them with his life. And he didn’t click with any of them the way he clicked with Superman.

Some relationships form effortlessly, like they were destined to happen. Batman and Superman’s relationship wasn’t like that at all. It had grown  _ despite _ Bruce’s best efforts to stamp it out, like destiny was shaking Bruce by the shoulders and shouting at him that he  _ would _ have feelings for Superman, whether he liked it or not, and there was nothing he could do about it, goddamnit.

“You’re right. We haven’t,” Bruce finally admitted, after a long stretch of silence passed between them. He could refuse to act on his feelings all he wanted. He could deny them and distract himself from them, but he was going to have to do it like a grown-ass adult instead of giving Superman the cold shoulder like a jilted middle schooler.

“So can we move on? And I’ll do my best not to make things ‘complicated’ again.” Superman paused, smirked, and added, jokingly, “Scout’s honor.”

It broke the tension between them – most of it, anyway – and Bruce felt something like a weight lifting off of his chest. “Sure.”

His relief lasted only until he got home and realized it was Saturday, and he was meant to be meeting Clark that evening for their third date. He’d completely forgotten, and now he barely had enough time to get changed and speed to Metropolis. He cursed himself. He was supposed to be using  _ Clark _ to distract him from  _ Superman _ , not the other way around.

He drove like a bat out of hell, arrived right on time, and then wasted a full ten minutes trying to find parking. When he finally found a spot, he practically ran down the street to Clark’s building, where Clark buzzed him in.

“Sorry I’m late,” Bruce told him when he entered Clark’s apartment. It looked like a scene straight out of a romantic comedy: Clark’s small kitchen table adorned with a tablecloth and candles, the lights dim, music drifting in from the adjoining living room. From anyone else, it would have been unbearably cliché, but the earnest grin on Clark’s face had Bruce smiling instead of rolling his eyes.

Clark glanced at his watch. “I didn’t even notice,” he said, then glanced back up to take Bruce in. He raised an eyebrow. “You know it’s the weekend, right? Why are you dressed like you just came from the office?”

“This is how I dress.”

“All the time?” Clark exclaimed. At Bruce’s nod, he said, “That’s a tragedy. I don’t know what I’d do if I had to dress like that on my days off. You must be so uncomfortable.” Clark paused and looked him over again. “You look good, though, so that’s something.”

“So do you,” Bruce replied. Clark was dressed much more informally, in jeans and a plaid button-up with the sleeves rolled up to his elbows. His hair wasn’t as perfectly styled as it usually was. Still, he looked irresistible. Bruce had a feeling Clark looked irresistible no matter what he wore. He had an even stronger feeling Clark looked irresistible wearing nothing at all.

Leaving that train of thought behind for the time being, Bruce added, “And so does your kitchen.”

“I had to borrow the candles from one of my coworkers,” Clark admitted. “And the tablecloth. She also gave me some wine recommendations. I don’t know shit about wine, but I figured you probably do, and I don’t want to look like an asshole for serving Bruce Wayne grocery store wine.” He gestured to a line of unopened bottles on the kitchen counter. “Here are your options.”

Bruce surveyed the options and chuckled. Clark frowned. “What? Please tell me my coworker didn’t steer me wrong.”

“No,” Bruce said quickly, dispelling Clark’s doubt. “These are good options. Your coworker knows her stuff.” He paused, considering his words. “Did you tell her who you’d be drinking these with?”

“I did. I know you probably want to be discreet, but she’s not just a coworker; she’s a close friend. And she’s the only one I’ve told.”

“It’s fine,” Bruce said, because it was. Frequently, when he went out with people, it was with the express purpose of getting attention from the press, maintaining his playboy reputation so nobody looked too hard at Bruce Wayne. His dates with Clark, by comparison, were positively under the radar. And he’d never asked Clark not to tell anyone they were dating. It hadn’t even occurred to him. If people knew about them, so what? What was there to know? It’s not like their relationship was serious.

“I figured you must have told her,” Bruce continued, “Because it would be a crazy coincidence otherwise.” He brandished one of the bottles. “These are from my winery in California. I own this brand.”

Clark stared at him for a long moment before shaking his head and laughing. “Of course you do.” He pulled out a chair for Bruce and they both sat down to eat.

“Looks delicious,” Bruce told him, and it really, really did. He hadn’t eaten since before the team-up with Superman, and he’d worked up a hell of an appetite.

They ate quickly, barely pausing to make conversation. It wasn’t ideal behavior for a date, but both of them were clearly starving, and there would be plenty of time to talk after they’d wolfed down Clark’s delicious meal.

Again, Bruce helped with the dishes, even though Clark tried to shoo him away from the sink. “You’re not letting me be a very good host,” Clark protested.

“You’ve been a great host,” Bruce countered. “What am I supposed to do, sit at the table by myself doing nothing while I watch you clean up? What kind of an asshole do you take me for?”

Clark laughed, and Bruce privately felt quite good about how many times he’d caused that to happen in the brief time since they’d met. For some reason, making Clark laugh felt like an accomplishment, even though it was easily done.

When the dishes were done, they went back to the table and made up for all the not-talking they’d done during dinner, refilling their glasses of wine. They talked briefly about Bruce’s winery until Clark, in his utter lack of knowledge about wine, ran out of pertinent questions to ask. They talked about anything interesting they’d gotten up to in the two weeks since their last date. They talked about current events, which transformed into debating about current events.

All the while, Bruce sipped at his wine idly; he had to drive home, and he didn’t want to get any more buzzed than Clark, who in all respects still seemed stone-cold sober. He thought about what had almost happened at the end of their second date. Yes, he definitely wanted to have his full mental capacity for what he was pretty sure would go down that night.

Clark was midway through his impassioned argument, one Bruce was looking forward to picking apart. It reminded him of the (many, many) times he’d argued with Superman over some detail of one of their joint missions, or a difference in their approaches to fighting crime, or one of the (many, many) other topics they disagreed on. Bruce dismissed the thought, determined to focus on  _ Clark _ . Clark, who was surprisingly stubborn when it came to his deeply held beliefs, who held his own in a debate, who didn’t take it personally when Bruce disagreed with him, who had a way with words that made Bruce realize why Clark made such a good journalist.

But Clark cut himself off before he could finish making his point. “I can’t believe you let me talk about politics for  _ two hours _ ,” he said, holding up his watch for Bruce to see and note that, indeed, it was well past nine. “We’re supposed to be on a date.”

Bruce shrugged, unaffected. “I don’t know what you’re supposed to talk about on a date, but I’m sure this is much interesting.” He drained the rest of the wine in his glass. Almost reflexively, Clark took his and Bruce’s empty glasses to the sink and rinsed them. Bruce leaned back in his chair and watched him. “So far, you’re the most interesting person I’ve ever dated.”

Clark visibly froze. Then he turned off the sink and spun around. “Liar,” he said, the sharpness in his tone belied by his incredulous grin. “I know the type of people you’ve been with. Heiresses. Athletes. Supermodels.  _ I’m _ the most interesting person you’ve ever dated?”

Bruce didn’t back down. “You are.” He explained, “Those people do interesting things, but that doesn’t make them interesting people. Not like you.”

Clark looked at him with that piercing, intelligent gaze. He dried off the wine glasses and then approached Bruce. Bruce stood to meet him. They seemed to communicate without words, so that Bruce knew exactly what Clark was about to do next. Again, it reminded Bruce of Superman, and the way the two of them worked together like they’d never been apart, fought together like they’d been training side-by-side all their lives, moved like two halves of a whole. But he didn’t have that much time to think about it before Clark kissed him.

This kiss was entirely different from the one they’d shared on their second date. Where that one had been frantic and desperate and fierce, this one was slower, more thorough. Clark sighed into Bruce’s mouth, a hand at the small of Bruce’s back guiding their bodies together. He seemed intent on taking his time, and Bruce indulged him. He didn’t have anywhere to be, and he couldn’t think of anywhere else he  _ wanted _ to be. Not in that moment.

It could have been minutes or hours later that they found themselves in Clark’s bedroom. Time seemed flexible, meaningless. It was fully dark, and Bruce didn’t spare a thought to how late it was or how Gotham would fare without him for a night. In fact, the only conscious thought he had after Clark took his clothes off was that he had been completely right to assume that Clark would look irresistible wearing nothing at all.


	7. Chapter 7

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I deviated from my outline on this one, but I realized I wrote six whole chapters with no Lois and that’s just unacceptable.

“I should get going.”

It took a monumental effort for Bruce to force himself out of Clark’s bed. It was approaching midnight, and it would take hours for Bruce to drive back to Gotham. He cringed to think of all the terrible things that could happen to the city while he wasn’t there to protect it. Besides, he hadn’t brought a change of clothes, he hadn’t even brought a toothbrush, and as much as he welcomed press coverage that would distract from his secret double life, he wasn’t eager to see photos of his Sunday Walk of Shame on the cover of some Gotham tabloid. He did have  _ some _ standards.

Clark propped himself up on one elbow and looked at him with concern. “Are you sure? It’s pretty late.”

“I’m used to staying up late,” Bruce assured him, already gathering his clothes up off the floor where he’d scattered them.

“Alright,” Clark said, sounding skeptical. “But I will see you again, right?”

Bruce met Clark’s gaze. He was slightly surprised, even though he knew he shouldn’t be. Of course, given Bruce’s reputation, Clark might assume Bruce wouldn’t give him the time of day after they’d slept together.

But Clark had nothing to worry about; Bruce knew that much already. Every minute he’d spent with Clark since they’d met had only reinforced Bruce’s decision to pursue him. He’d been briefly concerned that he might lose interest in Clark after they had sex, if only because he’d never had more than a casual, passing interest in anyone (Superman excluded, he bitterly admitted to himself). But Clark was different. Clark was intelligent, funny, and down-to-earth. He wasn’t after Bruce for his money or his reputation. The sex had been great, but so was the conversation, the company.

Bruce wasn’t ready to let that go just yet, and he didn’t see any reason why he should. This…  _ fling _ he was having with Clark was completely harmless. They were only three dates in, for fuck’s sake; no one was going to start developing inconvenient, complicated feelings after just three dates. Those sorts of things surely took a long time to develop. Bruce wouldn’t know, because he’d never actually been in a relationship before, but that was what he assumed. As long as no one got any grandiose ideas of commitment in their head, and as long as Bruce kept the comforting barrier of his secret identity between them – as long as Clark never knew who he  _ really _ was – he was safe.

“Of course,” Bruce said, as sincerely as he’d ever said anything, and Clark visibly relaxed.

“Do you have any Fourth of July plans?”

“Not yet.” This Bruce’s way of insinuating that he might be the type of person to make Fourth of July plans, even though he most assuredly was not. What was he going to do, have a picnic with his family and set off fireworks? Yeah, there was just one pretty major problem with that.

“You should watch the fireworks with me here in Metropolis,” Clark offered. “I know a rooftop with a great view.”

“I’d like that,” Bruce said with a smile.

He got dressed and Clark, pulling on his underwear and a t-shirt just so he didn’t walk to the front door naked, saw him out. Bruce felt a sort of lightness that he was entirely unused to. He couldn’t attribute it to the fact that he’d just gotten laid, because he did that all the time, and he’d never felt like this before. Only Clark had ever made him feel like this.

Well, Clark… and one other person. But Bruce was determined not to think about him, not when he had so many pleasant Clark-related things to think about.

Fourth of July came quickly, which was lucky, because ever since he’d made plans with Clark, Bruce had started looking forward to it in a way he usually didn’t. Holidays weren’t much more to him than days he didn’t have to go into work. The only person he had to celebrate with was Alfred, who wasn’t exactly the Fourth of July type, for obvious reasons.

The drive to Metropolis was a nightmare; people were heading to the city in droves to watch its infamous fireworks display. Bruce crawled all the way there, finally arriving at the address Clark had texted him. He circled the block several times – the parking situation was even worse than the traffic – before finally settling on a parking garage that was wildly overcharging for the occasion, then he met Clark outside the building’s front entrance.

“What is this place?” Bruce asked as Clark led him up several flights of stairs.

“My friend lives here,” Clark explained. “It’s our tradition to watch the fireworks together. She’s traveling for work right now, but the view from my building’s shit so she let me use her spare key.” Clark brandished a key he’d been twirling around his forefinger and used it to unlock the door to the rooftop.

It was a nice space, clearly designed for entertaining, with tables and chairs and even a grill. Residents had gathered in small, clustered groups. One of them had a radio playing patriotic country tunes at full volume. A few children ran around with sparklers. Clark wove through the sparse crowd, Bruce at his heels, and stopped abruptly when he noticed someone sitting alone at one of the tables: a young woman with long, dark hair, hunched over her phone, tapping away.

“Lois!” Clark exclaimed, getting the woman’s attention. Her head snapped up; upon seeing Clark, she grinned widely. “Shouldn’t you be halfway to Europe by now?”

“My flight got canceled,” Lois said, gaze flicking between Clark and Bruce. “You didn’t tell me you were bringing a guest.”

“Oh, yeah. Bruce, this is Lois Lane. She’s—”

“The  _ Daily Planet _ ’s top investigative reporter,” Bruce finished for him. “I remember.”

Lois’ grin widened. “Did Clark tell you that?” She didn’t wait for Bruce to answer, instead extending a hand for him to shake. “And you’re obviously Bruce Wayne. I’ve heard all about you.”

“She hasn’t heard  _ all _ about you,” Clark interjected.

“That’s true,” Lois admitted. “Clark’s been thin on the details. Annoyingly.” She gestured to two empty chairs across from her. “Have a seat. Show starts in thirty minutes. That gives me plenty of time to tell you all the embarrassing things I know about Clark.”

If Clark had warned Bruce at the start of the evening that there was a chance they might run into one of Clark’s friends, Bruce probably would have called the whole thing off. They weren’t anywhere near far enough into their relationship to start meeting the important people in each other’s lives, and if Bruce had his way, they never would be. He had no desire to start weaving their lives together, integrating their social circles. That would only make things more complicated when they inevitably stopped seeing each other.

But it was difficult for Bruce to stick to his guns on the matter when confronted with a woman like Lois Lane. Much like Clark, she was instantly impossible to dislike, but for different reasons entirely. Whereas Clark charmed you into liking him, Lois impressed you into liking her. She was quick-witted and sharp; one minute she spoke eloquently on a complicated issue she wanted to write about for the  _ Daily Planet _ , and the next she leaned across the table to stage-whisper to Bruce about the time Clark made a fool of himself in front of the mayor. She asked insightful questions about Bruce’s life in between lambasting Gotham’s corrupt city government.

She was a fascinating woman, and Bruce thought that if all Clark’s friends were like this, maybe he wouldn’t mind meeting them after all.

Thirty minutes passed in a blur, and then ten more. “Weren’t the fireworks supposed to have started by now?” Clark asked.

“Ten minutes ago,” Lois said, holding up the time on her phone. “Technical difficulties, maybe?”

“Maybe.” Clark frowned and looked off into the distance, squinting into the night. The conversation continued, but Clark was obviously distracted; when it became clear he wasn’t listening, Lois tapped him on the shoulder to get his attention.

“Do you guys want something to drink?” she offered, standing and gesturing vaguely toward the stairs that led, presumably, down to her floor. “I’m dying out here. I think I have a six pack in the fridge.”

Clark shot to his feet. “I can get it,” he offered, like the chivalrous guy he was.

Lois smirked at him. “I don’t let strange men in my apartment by themselves,” she teased, then turned and disappeared through the door into the building.

Clark checked his watch. “Now they’re twenty minutes late,” he said. “Something’s definitely up.” He took out his phone, scanning the news alerts, pausing every few seconds to look back out over the horizon; at what, Bruce couldn’t imagine. After a few minutes, he swore under his breath: “Fuck. You’re about to think I’m the world’s biggest asshole.”

“Why?”

“I have to go.” Clark pocketed his phone and stood. “Apparently Lex Luthor sabotaged the fireworks display. I’m sure Superman will be there soon, which means I have to be there to report on it. My boss will want this on the front page tomorrow morning, and I’m sort of the  _ Daily Planet _ ’s go-to superhero reporter.”

Bruce carefully kept his irritation off his face.  _ Not this again. _ But he wasn’t going to keep Clark from doing his job, so he just said, “Do what you have to do. I’ll be fine.”

“Are you sure?”

_ No, _ Bruce thought bitterly. “I’m sure,” he said aloud.

“Thanks.” Clark was already halfway to the door. “Seriously. I’ll make it up to you, I promise!”

Once Clark was gone, Bruce sat at the table alone, wondering what he should do now. It would make the most sense for him to just leave. He didn’t know how long Clark would be gone, or if he even planned on coming back. And he didn’t really care about watching the fireworks; he’d just wanted to see Clark.

Before he could make a decision, however, Lois reappeared with a six pack of beer, as promised. She set it on the table with a thud and looked around. “What happened to Clark?”

“Apparently Lex Luthor sabotaged the fireworks display and he has to report on it,” Bruce explained, a little sullenly.

“Ah. Duty calls.” Lois seemed entirely unsurprised by this turn of events, which told Bruce that this wasn’t unusual behavior for Clark.

A thought occurred to him. “Can I ask you a question?” He didn’t wait for Lois to answer. “Are all reporters like this?”

Lois cracked a beer open and sat down. “To an extent. Why? Has he ditched you before?”

“Yes.”

“And this is, what, only your fourth date?” She shook her head and chuckled. “That might be a new record for him.”

“So he does this to everyone,” Bruce surmised.

“Oh, yeah.” Lois shoved the rest of the six pack toward Bruce, and he took a can. “Like I said, to an extent, part of being a successful journalist is being willing to drop everything and report on breaking news when it happens. But Clark sort of takes it to another level.” She chuckled again, like she was telling an inside joke only she understood. “Let’s just say he’s extremely dedicated to his work.”

Bruce could sort of understand that. He was a workaholic himself, even more so when it came to being Batman than being the CEO of Wayne Enterprises. “Did you and Clark meet at the  _ Planet _ ?”

“Yeah. We were interns together. Initially we were competing for the same position, but then another guy quit so they hired us both. Which is good for Clark, because I had that job offer in the bag.”

They kept talking over their drinks, and before long, a red flash in the sky followed by a distant boom alerted them to the start of the fireworks show.

Lois looked up and smiled. “Looks like Superman saved the day.” She had a sort of wistfulness in her voice that prompted Bruce’s next question.

“Have you ever met Superman?”

“He’s saved my life.”

“Really? What was that like?”

She laughed. Just like the rest of her, it was entirely different from Clark’s laugh. It was loud and brief and sharp. “Pretty fucking terrifying,” she said. “I’ve had more than my fair share of near-death experiences, but let me tell you, they don’t get better.”

“Is being a reporter really that dangerous?”

“If you do it right.”

Lois launched into a story of her time in a Syrian war zone, which dovetailed into a story about the time she interviewed a notorious serial killer in jail, and then into a story about the time she got caught in a forest fire. The fireworks show ended, and the crowd on the roof gradually thinned, until it was just the two of them. Clark emerged through the door and stopped dead when he saw them.

“Bruce,” he said, sounding surprised but not displeased. “I didn’t think you’d still be here.”

“Lois was just telling me about her reporting on the deforestation of the Amazon,” Bruce said. “Fascinating stuff.”

“What he’s saying is we had a way better time without you,” Lois deadpanned.

“Clearly,” Clark said with a smirk. “Looks like I missed the show. Was it any good?”

“Same as it is every year.” Lois stood and moved to shake Bruce’s hand again. “I have a flight to catch at seven in the morning, so I think I’d better turn in. You two lovebirds have a good night.” She left them with a wink.

Clark turned to Bruce. “I’m going to be up all night writing about this for tomorrow’s paper,” he said, “But I think I could procrastinate for an hour or two if you want to come over.”

Bruce considered this. He did have to get back to Gotham for his patrol, but he supposed he could spare an hour or two. After all, if Clark was willing to take a break from work to make time for him, it was only fair of Bruce to do the same.

“You did promise to make it up to me for ditching me again,” he reminded Clark, who grinned.

“Oh, I can think of more than a few ways to make it up to you.”


	8. Chapter 8

Bruce was not what anyone would call a particularly forgiving person. If holding grudges was an Olympic sport, he’d have more medals than Michael Phelps. So it was entirely uncharacteristic of him not to call things off with Clark after Clark ditched him for the second time in only four dates.

He wasn’t sure what had gotten into him. Normally, he had no problem cutting people out of his life, particularly people he’d slept with. But Clark had had good reasons for ditching Bruce those two times, and his flakiness really did seem to be his only discernible flaw. In every other respect, he was perfect. He wasn’t clingy or moody or rude, he never demanded more from Bruce than Bruce was willing to give. He let Bruce pay for things when they went out, but he clearly didn’t expect Bruce to bankroll some sort of luxury lifestyle for him. He hadn’t tried to use Bruce to get his fifteen minutes of fame. Bruce liked spending time with Clark, he liked talking to him, and yeah, okay, sure, he liked having sex with him, but he’d liked having sex with lots of people, and so far none of them had made anywhere near the sort of impression on him that Clark had.

So Bruce didn’t call things off with Clark. In fact, just the opposite. They went out several more times after the Fourth of July, and Bruce was reassured of his decision when Clark didn’t ditch him again throughout the entire month of July and the first half of August. They mostly met in Metropolis, because Bruce was aware that it was easier for him to go to Clark than it was for Clark to come to him. Clark took Bruce on a tour of Metropolis’ most underrated restaurants and bars, or else he invited Bruce to his apartment and attempted to introduce him to his favorite shows, which Bruce was far less interested in than talking to or having sex with Clark, so they mostly ended up talking or having sex with Netflix on in the background.

When they talked, they covered a wide range of topics: work, politics, current events, anecdotes from Bruce’s life as a billionaire or Clark’s life as a journalist. Sometimes Clark talked about his childhood or his parents, but he had enough tact not to ask Bruce to reciprocate. Clark seemed to instinctively know what topics to avoid around Bruce: childhood, parents, and, weirdly enough, Superman. Bruce had, by this point, grown familiar enough with Clark’s work to know Clark wrote frequently about Superman, yet the Man of Steel was conspicuously absent from their conversations.

As August was winding down, Clark invited Bruce to his apartment for another round of Netflix and talking and sex. Clark ordered takeout and put  _ Stranger Things _ on in the background. They were on season two and Bruce couldn’t name one thing that had happened.

“We’ve been indulging in my hobbies for the past few dates,” Clark said after the first episode, clearing away their empty food containers. “You should show me one of your hobbies.”

Bruce remembered the conversation they’d had on their first date, when Clark had quizzed him about his (entirely fabricated) passion for extreme sports. “You want to go skydiving?” he suggested jokingly.

“I was actually thinking rock climbing,” Clark said. “Real, outdoor rock climbing. I could use some wide open spaces.”

Bruce considered Clark’s suggestion. He had to admit, as much as he enjoyed he and Clark’s established “Netflix and talking and sex” routine, it might be nice to change things up. “Sure,” he said. “We could go rock climbing.”

What Bruce hadn’t understood at the time, and what probably would have made him give a very different answer, was that Clark wasn’t just suggesting they take a day trip somewhere, climb for a few hours, and go home. Clark wanted to make a weekend of it, a last hurrah before summer ended.

Clark wanted to go camping.

Suffice it to say, Bruce was not the camping type. His first thought was to cancel, but Clark had already gotten excited about their plans and Bruce couldn’t find it within himself to let him down. So he went and bought camping gear and decided maybe it wouldn’t be so bad as long as Clark was with him.

Some quick Googling directed Bruce to a state park that offered both camping and rock climbing, and when he texted links to Clark, Clark responded with two thumbs-up emojis. They made plans to meet in Gotham, since there was no point in Bruce driving down to Metropolis only to backtrack north again to get to their destination.

It didn’t escape Bruce’s attention that this meant Clark would be visiting Wayne Manor for the first time, if only briefly. He wasn’t sure how he felt about that. He thought about giving Alfred the day off – Alfred was the closest thing he had to family, and he and Clark  _ definitely _ hadn’t reached the “meet the family” stage of their relationship (and they never would, Bruce firmly reminded himself) – but knew that would only make Alfred suspicious. Alfred took a two week vacation to England once a year and that was the extent of his time off. As far as Bruce could remember, he’d never even taken a sick day. If Bruce hadn’t inherited his workaholic nature from his parents, he’d definitely learned it from Alfred.

Left with no other option, Bruce let Alfred in on his weekend plans. As always, Alfred showed remarkable restraint in not reacting to anything Bruce told him, though Bruce knew him well enough to know he was surprised. And why shouldn’t he be? Bruce hardly ever went on vacation, even short little weekend trips – he couldn’t bear leaving Gotham for a single night if he could help it – and he’d never in his adult life gone on vacation with another human being.

But Alfred didn’t say anything. He didn’t even ask any questions about this mystery man Bruce was going  _ camping _ with, of all things, even though he knew Bruce well enough to know that said mystery man must have been someone pretty special to convince Bruce to go  _ camping _ .

Clark arrived on Saturday morning, at a perfectly reasonable time by most people’s standards but way too damn early as far as Bruce was concerned. They had over two hours of driving ahead of them, and Bruce was on his third cup of coffee and gradually shaking off the last remnants of sleep when the doorbell rang. He’d meant to greet Clark himself, but Alfred was quicker on the draw, halfway to the front door before Bruce had even left the kitchen. Their conversation echoed through the spacious halls of the manor.

“You must be Mr. Kent,” said Alfred, perfectly polite as always. “Come in. Shall I take your bags to the car?”

“Oh, no, it’s fine; I can carry them. You’re… Alfred, right?” Bruce was surprised Clark had remembered Alfred’s name. Bruce was pretty sure he’d only mentioned it to him once or twice. He supposed journalists had to have a good memory for names, but still, it was impressive.

“That I am. Alfred Pennyworth. It’s a pleasure to meet you.”

Alfred escorted Clark to the kitchen, where Bruce was refilling his thermos for the fourth time; they were definitely going to be making multiple bathroom stops on their way to the park, but it was unavoidable if Bruce was expected to be awake enough to drive them there.

Clark looked like he’d stepped straight out of a Patagonia catalogue, dressed in a faded Grand Canyon t-shirt that was a half-size too small and accentuated his muscular frame in all the best possible ways, pants with plenty of pockets to hold all the assorted bullshit one might need while camping, and a versatile pair of well-worn sneakers. He carried a backpack slung over one shoulder and a duffel bag over the other.

He looked good, and Bruce had to begrudgingly admit that he was already starting to like camping a hell of a lot more than he did thirty seconds ago.

From where he stood a few feet behind Clark, Alfred caught Bruce’s gaze, looked pointedly at Clark, then looked back and raised his eyebrows in an expression that translated roughly as, “I’m forcing you to talk about this when you get home.” Bruce cringed. He’d been hoping to avoid that particular conversation.

With that nonverbal warning delivered, Alfred left the room, leaving Clark and Bruce alone. Silence stretched between them for a few long moments before Clark cleared his throat and spoke. “So this is the infamous Wayne Manor.” He sounded appropriately overwhelmed. It was a very big house for one man to live in all by himself. (Well, all by himself with his butler.) “You’ll have to give me the grand tour someday.”

Words like “someday” made Bruce nervous in this context. Even making vague plans for the future felt like more commitment than he was ready for. So he cut off that line of conversation before it could go in an uncomfortable direction. “Do you have everything you need?”

“I think so,” Clark replied. “You?”

“I can only hope.”

Clark nodded to Bruce’s outfit, which wasn’t dissimilar to Clark’s, except he’d bought a t-shirt that actually fit. “You look great,” Clark said. “You know this was all a ploy to finally get you into something more casual, right?”

“I’m not surprised.”

They entered the garage, where Bruce had already loaded all the necessary supplies for the trip into the back of the most rugged car he owned (other than the Batmobile), a black Jeep Wrangler he rarely drove. Clark surveyed the space with a bemused expression on his face, shaking his head slowly.

“You’ve got to be fucking kidding me. Your garage, first of all, is bigger than my apartment. Second of all,” he gestured at the rows of pristine black cars, “I can tell you’ve got a theme going on here.” Bruce popped open the Jeep’s trunk and Clark tossed his bags inside. “At least they don’t all have vanity plates. I still have some respect for you.”

Bruce rolled his eyes. “Get in the car.”

The drive north was pleasant. They talked about work and other uncomplicated topics, occasionally lapsing into stretches of comfortable silence as the lush green New Jersey scenery whipped past their windows. Traffic was light, and they made record time; Bruce followed the signs to the park and parked in a gravel lot surrounded by forest, with marked trails leading off into the trees. Birdsong drifted down from the branches, and the sky overhead was cloudless and blue. It was, in a word, idyllic.

They left the tent and sleeping bags in the car and took only what they’d need for rock climbing. “Ever been here before?” Clark asked, riffling through the trunk once more to double check they hadn’t forgotten anything.

“I haven’t.”

“It’s seriously beautiful,” Clark observed, squinting at the sun that filtered through the trees in shafts of golden light.

Bruce had to agree. Though he was by no means outdoorsy, even he had to appreciate what Mother Nature had to offer, at least aesthetically.

Since neither of them knew any more than the other where the hell they were going, Clark took the lead. He briefly examined a map of the park before marching confidently down a trail toward the areas marked for climbing.

They reached their destination as the sun crept toward the center of the sky, and it was sweltering. Bruce had known this would be the case when he agreed to the trip – it was August, after all – but that didn’t mean he was enjoying it. He was already sweating through his shirt and all they’d done was walk half a mile down a mostly flat trail. Meanwhile, Clark appeared untouched by the heat.

“Have you done this before?” Bruce asked. Clark was a fit, outdoorsy guy; Bruce would be surprised if he’d never been rock climbing. Sure enough, Clark nodded. “Good. No need to show you the ropes, then.”

Clark grinned at him. “Was that a pun?”

Bruce repeated his own words in his head before frowning. “Absolutely not,” he insisted. “Besides, we’re bouldering. There are no ropes.”

Clark smirked like he didn’t quite believe him, but let it go. He took a swig from his water bottle, chalked up his hands, and started climbing. Bruce followed suit. It wasn’t a particularly challenging climb, especially not for a man of Bruce’s fitness level. Where he would usually downplay his strength and agility to deflect suspicion, it didn’t seem necessary in this situation. As far as Clark knew, he went rock climbing all the time, so it made sense that he’d be good at it.

It also quickly became apparent that Clark’s muscular build wasn’t just for show. As the day wore on and the temperature crept higher, Clark never even broke a sweat. Meanwhile, Bruce was having the opposite experience. He stripped his shirt off about an hour in, which earned him Clark’s attention. Under any other circumstances, the way Clark was looking at him would have gone straight to Bruce’s head and given him all kinds of ideas, but in his current state, Bruce didn’t feel particularly sexy. He was drenched in sweat, to the point where any effort to reapply bug spray or sunscreen felt futile.

As a result, by the time they decided to call it a day so they could set up camp before the sun set, Bruce’s arms were dotted with mosquito bites and his face and shoulders were turning pink. He wanted nothing more than to take a long, cold shower and sleep in his own bed. Spending the night in a sweaty sleeping bag on the ground felt like a special brand of torture, and he began to question the wisdom of agreeing to all this just because of Clark.

“That was fun,” Clark said as they unpacked the rest of their supplies from the Jeep. “Thanks for doing this with me.” He offered a smile so genuine it managed to sneak past the wall of Bruce’s irritation, and Bruce smiled back. At least Clark was enjoying himself, he thought.

Loaded up with armfuls of camping gear, they headed off down another trail toward the campsite.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Sorry for the late chapter (again). I’ll try to finish the next one quickly so you don’t have to wait too long to find out how the camping trip ends.


	9. Chapter 9

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Two chapters for the price of one!
> 
> I have only been camping three times in my entire life, but if I learned anything from those experiences, it’s that sleeping on the ground next to someone can get you to open up to them in ways you otherwise wouldn’t.

Clark pitched their tent while Bruce searched for the bathing facilities he remembered seeing on the map. He located the building and was relieved to find it in acceptable condition. Not the cleanest public bathroom he’d ever been in, but far from the worst, and a quick test of the showers produced lukewarm, if not hot, water. Once he returned with the good news, he made himself useful starting a fire, so that by the time the oranges and pinks of sunset faded into twilight, they had plenty of light to see by, in addition to the flashlights they’d brought. Bruce popped open a couple of portable folding chairs and Clark came to sit next to him, looking utterly content.

“I haven’t been camping in a  _ long _ time,” he said, relaxing into his chair. “I went all the time growing up. It was the only vacation we could afford. But once I moved out to Metropolis, I could never find the time. Or people to go with.”

“You’re the first person I’ve gone on vacation with in a long time,” Bruce replied. “I don’t leave Gotham often, and when I do, I usually prefer to be alone.”

“I get that,” Clark said. “Sometimes it’s nice to get away from everyone else’s expectations of you.”

Bruce had never put it into words, but now that he thought about it, Clark had hit it right on the head. Bruce spent his whole life weighed down by other people’s expectations. His whole life, he realized, except the time he spent with Clark. Clark didn’t expect anything of him; at least, not anything Bruce wasn’t happy to give. When Bruce was in public, he could never truly be himself without risking giving away his secret identity. He was constantly acting, rehearsing every word, choreographing every move. At night, on the streets of Gotham, he felt more alive than anywhere else, but he could never ignore the constant pressure that came with being who he was and doing what he did. He was always aware of the impossibly high stakes of failure.

With Clark, he felt… relaxed. At ease. Almost. He still had to keep up his secret identity, though he had shown more of his true self to Clark than he would to most people.

They talked for a while under the stars, until Clark eventually suggested they turn in for the night. Their flashlights led the way to the showers, where Bruce steadfastly ignored the alarmingly large spider spinning a web in the corner of his stall. He was, above all, relieved to wash away the dirt and sweat of the day’s activities. He changed into something more comfortable, brushed his teeth, and he and Clark returned to their campsite and crawled into their tent.

It occurred to Bruce, as they were making themselves comfortable (as comfortable as they could be  _ sleeping on the ground _ , Bruce thought irritably), that this would be the first time he and Clark would spend an entire night together. Bruce had never stuck around long after they’d had sex, always going back home to Gotham for his nightly patrol. It felt intimate, even though he’d had more than a few one-night stands spend the night in the Manor or his apartment in the city when they were too tired to make it home safely or just didn’t want to brave the crime-ridden streets of Gotham so late at night, which was a perfectly reasonable choice. It had never felt intimate then. But with Clark…

Well, everything was different with Clark. Bruce had already known this, but he’d never taken the time to consider the implications of it. He wasn’t sure he wanted to now. He shoved the thought aside. (He’d been doing that an awful lot lately.)

It was still very early for Bruce to be going to sleep. He knew he’d spend at least a few hours tossing and turning before exhaustion claimed him, so he settled in for a long night, but not before Clark reached out and took his hand in the darkness.

Bruce froze, squinting to make out Clark’s expression. Wordlessly, Clark leaned in and kissed him. It was utterly unlike any of the kisses they’d shared up to that point. It was slow, and sweet, and there was something behind it Bruce was almost afraid to put a name to. He felt a warmth spreading through him, not arousal but… but that something. That something he was too afraid to name. That something he’d been trying for longer than he cared to admit not to think about or consciously acknowledge. It was getting harder to ignore.

When they finally broke apart, Clark yawned and stretched as much as he could in the confines of the tent. They curled up next to each other, and it took only minutes for Clark to fall asleep, his breath slow and steady, his eyes peacefully closed. Bruce, on the other hand, was wide awake, and now his thoughts were racing.

Three months into the relationship, Bruce could no longer deny that he felt something for Clark he’d never wanted to feel. It was worryingly similar to the way he felt for Superman. It was starting, even, to eclipse the way he felt for Superman. But whereas with Superman, Bruce had gone running in the other direction as far and as fast as he could, he wasn’t quite ready to run away from Clark. He  _ liked _ Clark. He liked being with Clark. He’d given up so much, lost so much, and for the first time in a very long time he just wanted to have one thing, just this  _ one _ thing, goddamnit.

He fell asleep wondering if he could allow himself that much.

Bruce woke to the sounds of wildlife outside his tent, the light of the sun filtering in and illuminating Clark’s sleeping figure. Over the course of the night, they’d ended up somehow entwined, arms and legs wrapped around each other, foreheads nearly touching. Bruce extricated himself slowly, trying not to wake Clark, but Clark blinked his eyes open and smiled at him.

He wasn’t wearing his glasses. Not for the first time, it struck Bruce how different Clark looked without his glasses. Clark reached for their case and put them on.

“Sleep well?” Clark asked.

“Sure,” Bruce said. It wasn’t entirely false. It had taken him a while to get to sleep, true, but once he got there, he’d slept soundly until morning.

They emerged from the tent into the morning light, brushed their teeth again, ate breakfast, drank the coffee Bruce had brought with them. They sat in their foldout chairs in front of the ashes from last night’s fire. Bruce’s mosquito bites itched like hell and he put aloe on his sunburn.

“You can stop pretending,” Clark said, looking out into the trees. A pair of squirrels chased each other across the grass. Birds flitted around and filled the air with their chatter. Bruce turned to look at Clark questioningly. “Just admit it,” Clark continued, meeting Bruce’s gaze with a wry smirk. “You hate camping.”

“I don’t know what you’re talking about,” Bruce said resolutely. He brushed a spider off the arm of his chair.

Clark laughed. “You’re a terrible liar.” Bruce begged to differ, but kept it to himself. He didn’t think, “Excuse me, I happen to be an incredibly talented liar, one of the best I know as a matter of fact” was the right thing to say to the person you were dating. Let Clark assume he was a terrible liar. It would keep his secret safe. “What I don’t understand is, why agree to go camping if you hate it so much? We could have just gone rock climbing and then gone home.”

“You seemed excited about the idea.”

“This weekend was supposed to be about doing something  _ you _ like for a change.”

“I enjoy everything we do together.” This was the truth. Bruce hadn’t enjoyed the sweating and the itching and the burning and the sleeping on the ground. But he had enjoyed being with Clark. He always enjoyed being with Clark.

Clark looked at him for a long minute, then shook his head and looked back out into the trees. “I can’t tell if you genuinely mean the things you say or if you just know exactly what to say to get what you want.”

This took Bruce by surprise. Their relationship had so far progressed without a hitch. Only once had Clark shown any doubts, when Bruce had gone home after the first time they’d slept together instead of staying the night, and he’d seemed reassured when Bruce made plans to continue seeing him. But Clark was well within his rights to doubt Bruce’s sincerity. Bruce spent most of his time around others being completely insincere, and it wasn’t like he’d been perfectly honest and open with Clark. Again: his secret identity. His feelings for Superman.

“What do you think I want?” Bruce asked.

“I don’t know.” Clark turned and met his gaze. “What  _ do _ you want?”

This was it, Bruce realized. This was his chance. Tell the truth, or as much of it as he could without giving away his secret identity. Tell Clark the whole relationship had been a ploy to get over someone else he still had feelings for. Let Clark put an end to things. Get out before things got even more complicated than they already were. Screw getting over Superman. Bruce would find another way.

But then Bruce considered Clark’s question more carefully. What  _ did _ he want? At first, yes, all he’d wanted was a distraction. But that had stopped being the case a while ago. Now, what he wanted was to keep seeing Clark, even though he knew it was a bad idea. But was he actually ready to admit it?

He decided it didn’t matter if he was ready. If he couldn’t be honest with Clark about everything, at least he could be honest with him about this. “I want to keep seeing you. I mean it when I say I enjoy spending time with you.”

For what felt like a very long time, Clark just kept looking at him, and Bruce wished he knew what was going on in Clark’s head. Finally, Clark let out a breath and spoke. “There’s something I need to tell you.”

Bruce raised his eyebrows, prompting Clark to continue. He didn’t want to speak and break the spell that seemed to hang in the air between them, this strange atmosphere that made it somehow easier to open up about things they might have otherwise kept to themselves.

“When we first met,” Clark said slowly, like he still wasn’t sure he was ready to say it, though he picked up speed as he went, “I’d just gotten rejected by this person I felt pretty strongly for. It was stupid; I knew all along they didn’t feel the same way, but I still got pretty broken up about it. So when you showed an interest, I thought it might be good for me to put myself out there. I thought it might help me get over it.”

“A rebound,” Bruce said tonelessly. He couldn’t believe what he was hearing. Clark had started dating him to get over someone else. Clark was in exactly the same position he was in.

“It sounds kind of shitty when you put it like that,” Clark said with a self-deprecating smile. “Maybe it was shitty. But I want you to know that I don’t feel that way anymore. Honestly, you kind of surprised me. I didn’t think you were the type of guy who’d want to stick around.” He paused, then quietly added, “I didn’t think I’d want you to be.”

Bruce took a few seconds to absorb everything he’d just heard, then replied, “I guess I should probably tell you something too.”

“What?”

“When we first met, I was also getting over someone.”

Clark looked as surprised as Bruce felt. “You’re joking.”

“I’m serious. Mine was equally stupid. It never would have worked out, and I knew that.”

“But you can’t always help the way you feel,” Clark commiserated. “That’s… huh.”

“Yeah,” Bruce agreed.

Another long stretch of silence, broken when Clark spoke up suddenly. “Have you been with anyone else since we started dating? You don’t have to answer; I know we never explicitly agreed to be exclusive—”

“I haven’t,” Bruce interrupted. It was the first time he’d thought about it, but now that Clark had mentioned it, he hadn’t slept with anyone else, not just since he started dating Clark, but since he  _ met _ Clark. He hadn’t been interested.

“Could we be exclusive?” Clark asked. “Or is that not really how you operate? Far be it from me to try to tie down the great Bruce Wayne.”

Bruce didn’t even have to think about it. Fuck, he was in trouble. “I wouldn’t mind that.”


	10. Chapter 10

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Is a global pandemic a good enough excuse for not updating in four months?
> 
> Seriously, I’m sorry about the delay. My inspiration and motivation really took a hit when all this craziness went down and I figured I’d take a break from writing until it all blew over, but it looks like it might be a while before that happens and I don’t want to keep you all waiting even longer than you already have been. If you’ve stuck around, thank you, and I hope you enjoy the rest of the story.

When they returned to Wayne Manor, the first thing Bruce wanted to do – the very first thing, before greeting Alfred or making sure nothing catastrophic had happened during his one night away from Gotham – was take a hot shower in a bathroom that wasn’t infested with spiders. He said as much as he pulled the Jeep into the garage, no longer feeling like he had to hide his hatred of camping now that Clark had found him out.

“A shower would be nice,” Clark agreed, unloading his bags from the trunk.

“Then you should join me,” Bruce offered smoothly, because if there was anything better than taking a hot shower in a spider-free bathroom, it was taking a hot shower in a spider-free bathroom with Clark Kent.

Again, Clark agreed, and Bruce led him up one of the two grand staircases to the second floor, through the master bedroom, and into the master bathroom, which was easily twice as large as the kitchen in Clark’s apartment in Metropolis. Clark shook his head and rolled his eyes and muttered something about Bruce’s living arrangements being “fucking ridiculous” before Bruce gave him something better to do with his mouth.

They emerged over an hour later. Bruce entertained the idea of inviting Clark to stay for dinner, but no matter how much he liked Clark, Bruce was still an introvert at heart, and spending nearly two straight days in Clark’s company had thoroughly exhausted him. He saw Clark out the front door, they kissed on the front step, and Clark left with a promise to text Bruce to make plans to go out again as soon as their schedules permitted.

Alfred, who’d been not-so-mysteriously absent up until that moment (he knew to make himself scarce when Bruce had people over), cornered Bruce in his study shortly after Clark departed. He had an innocent look on his face and spoke with a carefully casual tone, which was how Bruce knew he was up to something. “How was the trip?” he asked. Bruce recalled the look Alfred had given him when Clark had shown up on Saturday morning to go camping, the nonverbal promise – threat, really – that they would _talk about this later_. Now was, apparently, “later.”

Bruce decided to start by offering  _ part _ of the truth instead of rebuffing Alfred outright, which would only make the butler more determined. “That’s the last time I ever go camping,” he said. Sure, it hadn’t been as bad as he’d expected, but it still wasn’t an experience he was itching to repeat. Bruce was now even more certain of one thing: He was not an outdoorsy person. “How was Gotham last night?” he asked, hoping to change the subject before Alfred got too hung up on this Clark thing.

Alfred shot him a look that said he knew  _ exactly _ what Bruce was trying, and it wouldn’t work. “Shockingly enough,” he said, “The city did not collapse in your absence.”

“Only because you were here to hold down the fort,” Bruce retorted, offering a wry smile. It wasn’t often that he went a night without patrolling the streets of Gotham, and Alfred had given up on trying to change his mind about that years ago. Only unavoidable business trips kept Bruce from fighting crime, and even then, he spent the entire night lying awake imagining everything that could be going wrong back home, without him there to stop it. He hadn’t experienced quite as much anxiety about it while spending the night with Clark, although that might have been because he’d been preoccupied with anxiety of a different sort, trying to untangle his feelings for Clark and decide whether or not those feelings meant he had to abandon the relationship.

Speaking of which… “So this Clark Kent,” Alfred prompted, and Bruce sighed audibly.

“I really don’t want to talk about it,” he said, though he knew this would work about as well as his earlier attempt to change the subject. Alfred had been dealing with his shit for too many years; he knew all of Bruce’s tricks, and he didn’t give up easily. Rather than let Bruce off easy, he gave a smile that said,  _ I know you don’t want to talk about it, but we’re going to anyway _ , and proceeded to do just that.

“How long have the two of you been seeing each other?”

Bruce debated shutting down and refusing to answer Alfred’s questions, but it seemed like a childish thing to do, so again, he went with the truth. “Three months.”

Alfred did a spectacular job of masking his surprise. This was easily the longest adult relationship Bruce had ever entered into, unless you counted his various past acquaintances-with-benefits. “What does he do?”

Bruce regarded Alfred skeptically. “You expect me to believe you went all weekend without looking him up?”

“Humor me.”

“He’s a journalist. He writes for the  _ Daily Planet _ .”

“How did you meet?”

“At a charity gala in Metropolis.”

“I suppose this explains where you’ve been running off to every weekend.”

“I suppose it does.” When Alfred didn’t say anything to that, Bruce hoped this brief interrogation might be over. “Any more questions?”

“Just one more. How on earth did he convince you to go  _ camping _ ?”

Bruce shrugged, trying to downplay what they both knew was obviously a very big deal. “He wanted to go camping. I thought it might be worth a shot.” He gestured to his sunburned face and added, “Next time, I’ll know better.”

Alfred gave him a cryptic look, one Bruce couldn’t quite decipher. “You should have him over for dinner sometime,” he said, smiling faintly. “Whenever you’re ready.” And then he turned and left Bruce alone with his thoughts.

Bruce did a lot of thinking in the weeks after the camping trip. He’d accepted that his feelings for Clark were more serious than he’d ever intended them to be, and he’d decided to continue the relationship regardless, even though he knew it was a risk, even though their relationship came with an expiration date stamped on it in red. He couldn’t find it within himself to end things between them. Not yet.

Meanwhile, his feelings for Superman lingered, but they didn’t disturb Bruce the way they used to. Before he met Clark, Bruce was so desperate to get over those feelings. Now, he didn’t feel that same urgency. His feelings for Superman had taken up residence in the back of his mind, hidden behind his feelings for Clark. They didn’t seem to matter as much, in comparison. In fact, Bruce hardly thought of them.

It helped that Bruce’s concerns about his relationship with Superman – that it wouldn’t recover after Superman had complicated things between them by confessing his feelings – were proven wrong. After a brief spell of awkwardness, things were more or less back to normal. They still worked together well, still made a good team, still did stupid things to try to keep each other from harm. They didn’t talk about much that wasn’t related to the mission at hand, but they still traded taunts and in-jokes. It was startlingly like friendship, and Bruce found he was perfectly content with that.

What he wasn’t content with, he thought after a particularly rough mission that had involved Bruce falling off a building (not a very tall one, he would later tell Alfred, though Alfred would not look reassured), was the way Superman was hovering around him, cloaked in concern, like Bruce might collapse and fall apart at any moment. “Quit looking at me like that,” he finally snapped, though the pain in his chest took most of the heat out of his tone. “I’m fine.”

Superman gave him a highly disbelieving look. “You have three fractured ribs.”

Right. X-ray vision. Sometimes Bruce forgot how pointless it was to try to lie to Superman about these things. “We can’t all be invulnerable.”

Superman regarded him for a very long moment during which Bruce could tell the Man of Steel was calling upon his vast reserves of willpower to keep from lecturing Bruce on personal safety. He evidently succeeded, and simply asked, “Are you going to be okay getting back to Gotham?”

Bruce appreciated being spared a lecture. He already knew he was going to get one from Alfred when he got home. He didn’t need another one from Superman. “I’ll be fine,” he said dismissively. “And even if I’m not, the Batmobile has autopilot.”

Superman reluctantly let Bruce go, even though Bruce’s autopilot remark didn’t seem to have done much to reassure him. Bruce did indeed have a lecture waiting for him at home. He sat through it even though it was the same one he got every time he came back from a night of patrol or a team-up with Superman injured, and then he turned his thoughts to something far more pleasant and texted Clark to ask when he was available to go out that weekend.

Their dates still mostly consisted of going to restaurants or bars or hanging out in Clark’s apartment, though Clark persisted in suggesting new and exciting things they could do, and Bruce humored him and agreed to some of them. They did an escape room with Lois, and set a new record for how fast they solved the room’s puzzle. They went to a comedy club one of Clark’s coworkers had recommended and Clark’s laughter filled the crowded room.

That particular weekend, though, they didn’t go anywhere. They stayed in, and for the umpteenth time ended up making out while the TV droned in the background, slowly making their way to the bedroom. Clark shoved Bruce against the nearest wall a little rougher than was strictly necessary, which normally would have turned Bruce on. Instead, in light of his recently fractured ribs, it knocked the wind out of him.

“Fuck,” he said, inhaling a sharp breath. “Stop.”

Clark instantly shifted modes, from arousal to concern. He stood back and looked Bruce over, like he could scan him for injury with a simple glance. “What’s wrong?” he asked.

“I got in a wreck last week.” Bruce knew he probably should have felt bad about how easily the lie came to him, but it couldn’t be helped.

“What happened? Are you okay?”

“I’m fine,” Bruce insisted, fighting his kneejerk reaction to feel annoyed whenever anyone showed genuine concern for his well-being. It didn’t help that the expression on Clark’s face was an echo of how Superman had looked when Bruce had first gotten injured. “This shit happens to me all the time. Not car wrecks,” he clarified, not wanting Clark to think he was a terrible driver. “Just general injuries.”

“From all the skydiving and extreme skiing,” Clark said, an attempt at humor without any real mirth behind it.

“Right.”

“Has it occurred to you to get some safer hobbies? And maybe drive a little slower?”

Bruce put on his uncaring billionaire smile, the pain in his chest having already faded. First Superman, then Alfred; he didn’t need Clark joining the ranks of people trying to talk him out of his dangerous lifestyle. He liked Clark, but if he had to choose between him and continuing to be Batman, well, it wouldn’t be a choice at all. “Where’s the fun in that?”

“Not dying is pretty fun,” Clark said, the conviction gone from his voice as he seemed to have realized he’d lost their argument before it began. “You should try it.”

Their night ended shortly after that, which Bruce felt a little guilty about. He could tell Clark was still worried about him, and Bruce couldn’t stand the feeling of being watched, again, like he might spontaneously break.

His next team-up with Superman, he got more of the same treatment. “Have your ribs even healed yet?” Superman asked before the mission began. “Don’t answer that; I’ll just check. No, they haven’t.”

Bruce turned to Superman with a scowl. “If you’re going to lecture me all night, I can go. I’ve been helping you track these people down for weeks, but if you want to kick me out now that it’s gotten ‘dangerous,’ I have shit I could be dealing with in Gotham.”

Superman rolled his eyes but didn’t say anything about wanting Bruce to leave. All he said was, “I don’t know why you put yourself through this.”

“You know exactly why,” Bruce retorted. Superman knew why Bruce risked everything to bring a little justice to the world, because Superman did exactly the same thing. He might be significantly less breakable than Bruce was, but that didn’t change the fact that both of them valued their own lives below the safety of others. Call it crazy, call it suicidal, but whatever it was, it was a prerequisite for becoming a superhero, and so it was a trait they both shared.

“I guess I do,” Superman admitted. “Doesn’t mean I’m happy about it.” He sighed, and the edge left his voice. “Listen, I know I promised not to make things ‘complicated,’ but I can’t promise to stop caring about your wellbeing. That’s what friends do.”

Bruce didn’t respond, and before long their mission distracted them from continuing the conversation any further. But it did help him realize something. Even if he got over Superman romantically, which it seemed like he was well on his way to accomplishing, there was no going back to where they’d begun. There was no future in which Bruce didn’t care whether Superman lived or died, and vice versa. He was just going to have to accept it.


	11. Chapter 11

“Hey.”

He’d called Clark as soon as he’d gotten back from his team-up with Superman. His realization – that even if he didn’t like it, there was nothing he could do to stop Superman from worrying, and he was just going to have to learn to live with it as long as they kept working together – had led inevitably to the conclusion that maybe it hadn’t been fair of him to get so annoyed at Clark for showing concern over his supposed “car accident.” Superman knew what it was like to live a dangerous life, never knowing which fight might be his last, and he still worried about Bruce for doing the exact same thing. Clark, on the other hand, was a completely normal person who, like most normal people, avoided things that were likely to injure or kill him. Like driving recklessly in fast cars. Or extreme sports.

Or saving the world.

So obviously Clark would react with concern when someone he knew fractured their ribs in a car accident. Fair enough.

It wasn’t something Bruce relished, the knowledge that he’d have to put up with one more person being  _ concerned _ about him, but he was mature enough to admit that that was a him problem, not a Clark problem.

So he’d called Clark.

“Hey,” Clark said on the other end of the line. “What’s up?”

Bruce got straight to the point, ripping it off like a bandaid before he could change his mind. “I was a dick the other night,” he admitted, fully aware he sounded like an angsty teenager reluctantly apologizing to his parents for missing curfew or having a party while they were out of town or something else people who weren’t Bruce had done when they were teenagers. He couldn’t help it. He wasn’t great at apologies. Not enough practice.

It seemed Clark wasn’t afraid to call him out on it. “Is that an apology?” he asked, sounding bemused even over the phone.

A long pause stretched between them before Bruce finally relented. “Yeah.”

“Usually an apology includes the words ‘I’m sorry.’”

Another pause, longer this time. “I’m sorry.”

Bruce thought he heard Clark chuckle. “It’s fine. I know I can be a little… overprotective. My ex had a problem with that too.”

“I have a few people in my life like that. The overprotective type.”

This time, Clark definitely chuckled. “That’s probably why it annoys you so much. I get it. Are we still on for Friday?”

They were. They met at Clark’s place, like they usually did. Clark had grown more insistent in his assurances that Bruce didn’t need to drive to Metropolis  _ every _ time they saw each other; Clark could take the train to Gotham occasionally, really, he didn’t mind, but Bruce waved him off every time. He told Clark he liked the long drives, which was partially true, but mostly he just wanted to keep Clark as far away from Alfred as possible. Ever since the camping trip, Alfred was bringing Clark up more and more frequently, asking if Clark wanted to come over for dinner, or lunch, or breakfast, or any reason at all.

Alfred had  _ never _ acted like this with  _ any _ of Bruce’s previous flings.

To be fair, five months in, whatever Bruce was doing with Clark could hardly still qualify as a “fling.” But Bruce didn’t think about that too deeply.

Halfway through their night together, Clark’s phone started buzzing on the coffee table, the screen displaying a photograph of a gray-haired, middle-aged woman under the word “Mom.” Clark frowned at the phone for a second, deliberating, before grabbing it.

“I should probably take this,” he said apologetically, standing up and walking a few paces into the kitchen. Bruce watched him go, heard him greet his mother with affection plain in his voice. He’d mostly gotten over being jealous of everyone else in the world who still had living parents, but he still felt a pang of something every now and then. He definitely felt it now.

“What’s up?” Clark was saying. He paused and listened while his mother spoke, glancing once over his shoulder to shoot Bruce another apologetic look. “That sounds great. Listen, though, is it alright if I call you back tomorrow to talk about this in detail? I’ve got someone over— _Yes_ , like a date. … His name’s Bruce. … Uh, around five months or so?”

Bruce didn’t need to be eavesdropping to hear Clark’s mother on the other line: “ _ Five months and you haven’t told us about him? _ ” Clark winced.

“I was going to tell you at Thanksgiving.”

Bruce didn’t catch what Mrs. Kent said to that, but her tone didn’t sound impressed, and Clark didn’t look any less chagrined. “I know, Ma,” he said. “It’s just… not that serious yet. I didn’t want you to get your hopes up. … I hope so. I like him. … Of course he is. … Like I said, Ma, it’s not that serious. … _If_ it does, sure. Ma,” Clark shot Bruce another look, “I’ve gotta get back to my date. Can we talk about this later? … I will. Love you, Ma.”

Clark hung up and returned to his spot next to Bruce on the sofa. “Sorry about that,” he said with an easy smile. Bruce shrugged off his apology.

“I’m assuming that was your mother?”

“Yeah. I hadn’t told her about you yet. My parents get a little too invested sometimes when I tell them I’m dating someone. They mean well.”

Bruce thought, briefly, of Alfred not-so-subtly trying to invite Clark back to Wayne Manor. He’d never had parents around to bug him about the people he was interested in. But he had something.

Later that night, Bruce was scrolling through his email in Clark’s bed. He never stayed the night after sex, always returning to Gotham in time to make sure the city was safe, but he didn’t leave as quickly as he used to. Clark was lying next to him, staring at the ceiling, a thoughtful look on his face. He turned and propped himself up on an elbow, getting Bruce’s attention.

“I’m still determined to find something we can do together that you enjoy,” he said out of nowhere, like he’d been thinking about it for a long time and finally decided to bring it up. “Other than sex.”

“You really don’t have to—” Bruce began, but Clark interrupted him with a smile.

“I know, I know, you don’t care what we do, you’re down for whatever. I’ll buy you a mug that says ‘World’s Most Accommodating Boyfriend.’”

Bruce’s gut clenched, his fight-or-flight instinct kicking in at the word “boyfriend.” A million thoughts vied for top billing in his brain, though none were as loud as the voice that blared like an alarm to  _ get out, put an end to it, things have gone too far. _ It took the fortitude of a bear for Bruce to listen instead to the voice that assured him it was just a word, and Clark hadn’t meant anything by it, he’d just spent an entire phone call telling his own mother things weren’t serious between them.

He purposefully didn’t think about the promise he’d made to himself when he chose to pursue Clark in the first place, that he’d cut things off as soon as either one of them started to show signs of getting too attached. He felt like an addict:  _ I can quit anytime I want. _

He almost didn’t register what Clark had said after: “Do you like going to the movies?”

Bruce shrugged, keeping any signs of his internal struggle off his face. “I don’t go often, but I’m not opposed to it.”

“That’s not quite the enthusiasm I’m looking for. What about sports? I get the impression that you’re not a sports guy.”

“Not really.” More accurately, Bruce didn’t like crowds of screaming people, which were kind of hard to avoid at sporting events.

“Thought so.” Clark paused, thinking. “What about the theater?” he suggested. “That’s a rich person thing, isn’t it? Going to the theater?”

If Bruce hadn’t already been schooling his features into careful neutrality, Clark might have noticed the way he shuttered. “I don’t go to the theater,” he said flatly.

Clark must not have picked up on Bruce’s discomfort, because he continued, staring off into space like he was lost in a far more pleasant memory than the one that was currently flashing through Bruce’s mind. “Yeah, I’m not much of a theater guy either, but I wouldn’t mind seeing something trendy like  _ Hamilton _ . I actually had tickets to see it with Lois in New York a few years ago, but I had to cancel at the last minute and she went without me. She still hasn’t let me live that one down.”

Bruce screwed his eyes shut, just for a second, just to get his bearings. “Clark,” he said forcefully, finally grabbing Clark’s attention. “I haven’t been to the theater since the night my parents died.” In an alley. On their way home from the theater. He remembered it in technicolor, surround sound, high definition. He remembered every detail.

Clark’s eyes widened, his regret immediately apparent. “Shit, Bruce I’m—”

“It’s fine,” Bruce interjected, not wanting this conversation to last any longer than it already had, and certainly not wanting any of Clark’s pity. “You didn’t know.”

The pause that stretched between them was heavy with Bruce’s memories and the words neither of them said. It might have stretched on endlessly if Clark hadn’t finally broken it.

“What about a concert?”

Bruce turned, blinked at him. He was surprised to find that Clark wasn’t looking at him with the same pity he was used to receiving from anyone anytime the subject of his parents came up. Clark just looked like he was waiting for Bruce to answer the question, and that… might have been the nicest thing he’d done for Bruce in the five or six months they’d known each other.

He didn’t know how to say it, because apologies were one thing he didn’t have enough practice with, and thanks were another, but he felt compelled to say it anyway. “Thank you. For never bringing it up. I prefer not to talk about it.”

“I figured,” Clark said, and that was the last either of them said on the subject for the rest of the night.

Weeks later, the cool autumn chill of October had settled into something colder, harsher, more biting as the months shifted. Winter was in the air, and storefronts were already decorated for the holidays. Even Bruce had something to look forward to; crime rates tended to drop with the temperature.

“Does Clark have any plans this Thanksgiving?” Alfred asked one evening over dinner. Bruce wondered if Mrs. Kent was as insistent about bringing him up to Clark as Alfred was about bringing Clark up to Bruce.

“I think he’s visiting his parents,” Bruce said. “Why do you ask?” He knew why.

“I thought we might invite him over.”

Bruce shot Alfred a look. “We don’t celebrate Thanksgiving.” Those family-centric holidays, as far as Bruce was concerned, had died with his parents. Alfred had tried, for a few years after their deaths, to keep the traditions alive, but Bruce had resisted, and eventually Alfred had given it up in favor of all the other, more important battles he had to fight with teenage Bruce on a daily basis.

“We used to.”

“Well, he’ll be with his parents, so it doesn’t matter,” Bruce said dismissively, fighting back memories of Thanksgivings with his parents; the few he could remember, anyway.

“The week after Thanksgiving, perhaps?”

“You’re determined to have him over,” he said, glaring at Alfred, who fought hard to keep an innocent look on his face. Bruce sighed, seeing straight through Alfred’s facade. “Fine. I’ll ask about the week after Thanksgiving.”

He pretended not to notice Alfred’s smug look of satisfaction.


	12. Chapter 12

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This might be my favorite chapter that I’ve written so far.

Bruce waited in the parlor, staring out the large windows that looked out onto the long, circular driveway. A light dusting of snow carpeted the ground. His thoughts were a minefield. Though Clark had been to Wayne Manor twice before – briefly, before and after their camping trip – and even met Alfred, this time felt different. It  _ was _ different. Bruce had never done the whole “meet the parents” routine with any of his previous partners, not just because he didn’t have parents, but because he’d never been with anyone anywhere near long enough to even consider sitting them down for a formal dinner with the closest thing he had to a parental figure.

After seven months together, Clark had apparently made the cut. Bruce did his best to convince himself this meant nothing, that he’d only agreed to invite Clark after weeks of Alfred’s pestering, but he couldn’t stretch his formidable powers of denial quite that far. They were already stretched to the limit.

It did mean something. It meant Bruce was in way over his head. And he had been, he knew he had been, for  _ months _ . Since the camping trip. Maybe even earlier.

A white Toyota Corolla pulled past the front gates, which were left open in anticipation of company, its tires crunching on the gravel, a pink Lyft sticker adorning its window. Bruce locked his complicated feelings away. He’d have plenty of time to dwell on them later.

The car came to a halt and Clark stepped out of the backseat, waving thanks to his driver, and jogged up the steps to the front door of the manor. He was bundled up in a peacoat and scarf, hands in his pockets, breath ghosting out in the air in front of him. He reached out and Bruce heard the doorbell echo loudly through the house. Bruce took the few steps to the door, swung it open. Clark greeted him with a grin that twisted Bruce’s stomach. There weren’t a lot of people in Bruce’s life who were always happy to see him.

“Hey,” Clark said cheerily. Bruce stepped aside to let him in, shut the door behind him to keep out the cold. “Thanks for having me.”

“Of course,” Bruce replied. “How was Kansas?” He hung up Clark’s coat and scarf and led him into the house. As large and as old as Wayne Manor was, with its high ceilings and its wood and marble floors, it was difficult to heat in the winter, so there was a chill throughout the house, but Clark seemed fine in his button-up shirt and jeans.

“It was great. I always look forward to going home for Thanksgiving. My mom’s an amazing cook.”

“Better than you?” Bruce remembered the first two times Clark had him over and cooked them both dinner. Those dinners hadn’t been as good as the ones Alfred cooked, but they’d come close.

“Way better than me,” Clark said with a smile. Bruce couldn’t help but smile back.

“I’ll have to take your word for it.”

They entered the formal dining room, with a long, polished wooden table that sat twelve. It was overkill for a dinner for three, but Alfred had insisted that the smaller table in the kitchen wasn’t fit for company. An ornate cabinet displayed china and crystal dishes and silver cutlery that hadn’t been used in decades, if ever. A crystal chandelier hung from the ceiling and an antique Turkish rug carpeted the floor.

Bruce glanced over at Clark, who was still taking in the room in all its glory. He had a familiar expression on his face, the look of a man who’d lived a completely normal life up until that point and had never really taken the time to imagine what life must be like for the one percent of the one percent, even though he’d been dating one for months. He’d never imagined what it must be like to live in a mansion, to have rooms in your house you didn’t so much as set foot in most days, to be constantly surrounded by rare and expensive things. It was a look that never failed to remind Bruce how utterly jaded he’d become that none of these things fazed him, how ridiculously privileged his life had been, dead parents or not.

Alfred entered the room with his arms laden with dishes, laying out their meal. He poured wine into crystal goblets and pulled out their chairs. “Pleasure to see you again, Mr. Kent,” he said.

“Clark, please,” Clark insisted. He and Bruce took their seats. Only when they were seated did Alfred join them. They laid their cloth napkins on their laps. Clark’s table manners were impeccable for someone who hadn’t been raised, like Bruce, in the upper echelons of society, hadn’t had formal etiquette drilled into him from a young age. Bruce supposed a journalist of Clark’s caliber would attend his fair share of formal dinners.

“Master Bruce tells me you’ve just returned from visiting your family in Kansas,” Alfred began. “Is that where you grew up?”

“It is,” Clark said. “A little town called Smallville.” He paused, took a bite of his food, chewed, swallowed, sipped his wine. “How long have you lived here in Gotham?”

“Nearly thirty years.”

“Have you worked for the Waynes this whole time?”

“I have.”

Clark snuck a glance at Bruce, something mischievous sparkling in his gaze. “So you’ve known Bruce all his life. I’m dying to know what he was like growing up.”

Alfred looked between them. “Much the same as he is now,” he answered diplomatically. “Extremely intelligent. Hardworking. Stubborn.”

Bruce wasn’t ashamed to admit that he’d been, at times, an absolute menace growing up. In addition to the usual teenage rebelliousness, he’d of course had a host of mental and emotional issues stemming from his parents’ deaths, issues he steadfastly refused to work through in a healthy way. “Alfred could tell you plenty of horror stories,” he told Clark, “Particularly from my teenage years.”

Alfred suppressed a smirk. “His teachers always said his grades were even more impressive considering how many fights he got into and how little attention he paid in class.”

He hadn’t gotten into  _ that _ many fights. Not at first. Only when one of the other students had taken shots at his parents. But of course, once they knew what buttons to push, they took any chance they could to get under his skin. It even got to the point where Alfred began considering a private tutor, but he hadn’t wanted to eliminate Bruce’s only source of social interaction with his peers, even though most of that interaction was negative.

Clark looked surprised to hear about Bruce’s delinquent history. “I always figured you were one of the popular types. I mean, you’re… Bruce Wayne.”

“Having a big house and a fancy name doesn’t make as much of a difference when everyone you go to school with comes from a family just as rich as yours.” And when you have dead parents that give you a convenient weakness for your peers to exploit.

“That’s crazy.” Clark shook his head in disbelief. “Growing up in Smallville could not have been more different.”

“How is Smallville these days?” Bruce asked, wanting to redirect the conversation away from his childhood.

“Oh, you know.” Clark shrugged. “Slowly dying, like practically every other small town in America. My parents have it better than a lot of folks, though. I worry about them sometimes, but the truth is, they’re good at taking care of themselves.”

Clark’s parents, Bruce knew, owned a decently sized farm. Some years, Clark had told him, were better than others; some years they barely scraped by, but they were good with money and saved whatever they could. Enough to send Clark to college with a partial scholarship, although it meant dipping into their retirement fund.

There had never even been a question as to whether Bruce would go to college, whether he would be able to afford it. He went from undergrad straight to business school, never worked a day to pay for either, and had a job waiting for him running his parents’ company when he got out.

“Do you always go home for Thanksgiving?” Alfred asked Clark.

“Every year.” Clark smiled at what Bruce assumed were happy memories. “What about you guys? What did you do?”

Bruce didn’t have any happy memories to draw on. The Thanksgivings that had been happy only served as reminders of what he’d lost. “We don’t celebrate Thanksgiving,” he said bluntly. “I’m not big on holidays.”

“Don’t you throw a big New Year’s Eve party here every year?”

Bruce plastered on his patented Bruce Wayne smile, the smile that hid everything he felt about holidays and what they represented, along with all his other inconvenient feelings. “New Year’s Eve is less of a holiday,” he said, “And more of an excuse to get drunk.”

Clark laughed at that. “Fair enough.”

After dinner, Bruce gave Clark a tour of the manor. Clark looked suitably impressed at the sheer size of everything, the rare antiques in every room, and the implied expense. “This place is like a museum,” he said. “I’m assuming all the art we’ve passed is insanely valuable?”

“Generally speaking,” Bruce said. “My mother was an art collector.” He wasn’t sure why he added that. Normally he avoided the subject of his parents at all costs. But it didn’t feel right, walking past the paintings and sculptures his mother had painstakingly and passionately curated without acknowledging her role in it all.

They entered the library, filled with old leather-bound books and priceless first editions. “And who was the book collector?” Clark asked.

“My grandfather, supposedly.” Bruce had never met the man, only heard of his legacy. He didn’t like the thought that his children – not that he would have any – would have a similarly nonexistent relationship with their grandparents. He’d never thought about it before. “The books in this room have hardly been touched in fifty years.”

“How old is this house?” Clark asked, surprised.

“Over two hundred years.”

“And it’s been in your family that whole time? Is that why you’d never leave Gotham? The family legacy?”

“Partially,” Bruce said, because it was the truth.

“Why else?”

Bruce paused. “There’s work to do here.” Also the truth.

“You mean the company? Or your charity work?”

“Both.” And more. Much more, that Bruce could never tell Clark about. He felt guilty. He never felt guilty for keeping his identity a secret. But Clark was so easy to talk to, and part of Bruce wanted nothing more than to trust him, if only Bruce was capable of that kind of trust.

They walked in silence through the library and into Bruce’s father’s study. There was a portrait of his parents hanging on the wall. Clark paused beneath it, staring at it consideringly. Bruce had stared at this same portrait many times, sometimes for hours at a time, missing them, wondering what they would say or do if they were still there with him, what advice they would give him, whether they’d be proud or disappointed with what he’d become.

“You look a lot like them.”

Clark spent the night, and it was the first night since they’d gone camping that Bruce didn’t leave to go on patrol. He had Alfred keeping an eye on things, and Alfred had promised to alert him if anything needed his attention, but nothing came up, and Bruce slept through the night with Clark by his side and thought to himself that his worst fears had been realized, and he was feeling something for Clark that he had sworn he would never let himself feel.

In the morning, Clark woke hours before Bruce, showered and dressed and woke Bruce briefly to tell him good morning and goodbye. Bruce roused himself enough to walk Clark to the door in his bathrobe, then trudged to the kitchen for breakfast. Alfred met him there, looking only a little smug.

“Clark seems like a well-rounded young man,” he said evenly. “I’m impressed.”

“Good to know he’s earned the Alfred seal of approval,” Bruce said, a little gruffly, which was to be expected before his first cup of coffee.

Alfred looked like he was considering his next words very carefully. Bruce understood why once Alfred spoke. “Have you given any thought to letting him in on your secret?”

_ Yes, _ Bruce thought. “Of course not,” he said. The truth was, he hadn’t so much thought about it as wished it. He wished he didn’t have to keep this secret between him and Clark. He wished he didn’t even have a secret to keep in the first place. He wished he was the type of normal guy – as normal as a billionaire could be – that Clark deserved. But Bruce would never give up on protecting Gotham. Not for anyone. And not for Clark.

That, he knew, was why he should have stuck to his original plan and ended their relationship the minute it started to get complicated. He should have ended it after the camping trip. But he hadn’t, because he hadn’t been willing to give up this one good thing, the single shred of normalcy he had in his life. That, ultimately, had been his weakness. And that was why he was now trapped in a relationship that had been doomed from the start, but that he wasn’t yet strong enough to put a stop to.

“You don’t think he’s trustworthy?” Alfred asked.

“I haven’t known him long enough to say one way or the other.” It was a convenient lie. Seven months wasn’t that long, in the scheme of things. Not long enough to trust someone with your life. At least, Bruce didn’t think so.

Alfred looked doubtful, but all he said was, “I suppose I’ll have to trust your judgment.”

“That’s rare of you.”

Again, Alfred considered his words carefully. Bruce braced himself for another bombshell. “I do hope you’re able to confide in him in other ways,” Alfred finally said, and Bruce felt his concern like a wave, drowning him. “I worry about you, keeping almost everything to yourself.”


	13. Chapter 13

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> One more chapter after this one.

Bruce’s parents had always been the hosting type. They hosted some sort of dinner or gala practically every weekend, and Bruce had plenty of memories of being dressed in a suit and tie and fawned over by his parents’ friends. When he was especially young, his parents would always reward him for his good behavior; once he got older, it was simply expected of him. He remembered thinking bitterly, in the way kids do when they think they’ve gotten the short end of the stick, how unfair his life was that he had to put on a show for his parents’ stuffy rich friends. Looking back, Bruce had to shake his head at how naive he’d been.

Once Bruce reached adulthood, he made no effort to follow in his parents’ social footsteps. He held the odd charity gala and occasionally hosted old friends of his parents, but Wayne Manor was far from the bustling societal hub it had once been.

The one exception came on New Year’s Eve. Even after Bruce had stopped celebrating every other holiday, he’d kept New Year’s; it fit the image he’d cultivated of a partying playboy billionaire. So every year he threw the gates open to Wayne Manor and invited all the young heirs and heiresses, the nerdy tech CEOs, a handful of supermodels and athletes, basically anyone rich or famous under the age of forty. They came and they drank and they cheered when the clock struck twelve. It wasn’t something Bruce looked forward to, it was just something he did because he felt like he had to. There were a lot of things like that in his life.

This year he’d invited Clark, and when Clark had hesitated, saying he and Lois had spent every New Year’s together since they’d met in college, Bruce invited Lois as well. By the time they arrived, the ballroom was brimming with throngs of people milling about with drinks in their hands, schmoozing and flirting and not-so-subtly bragging about their wealth. Alfred found Bruce in the crowd so he could greet them in the entrance hall.

“Glad you could both make it,” he said once they’d hung up their coats, scarves, and gloves. Underneath their winter gear, Clark was wearing what looked like the same suit he wore to every high society event, while Lois was dressed to the nines in a sleek black dress and towering heels, hair swept back in a glamorous updo, Chanel clutch in hand. She would blend right in.

“Wouldn’t miss it,” Clark said with a grin.

Loud laughter and conversation drifted down the hall. Bruce led them into the ballroom, weaving through clusters of women in cocktail dresses and men in tailored suits. “And here I thought Times Square was the place to be on New Year’s Eve,” Lois observed.

“Can I get either of you something to drink?” Bruce asked.

“Champagne would be great,” she said.

“I guess I’ll have champagne as well,” Clark agreed.

Bruce snagged a trio of champagne flutes from a passing waiter and distributed them amongst the three of them. “How are things at the  _ Planet _ ?” he asked, mostly to Lois, since Clark more or less kept him up to date on everything he was doing.

They talked for a good twenty or thirty minutes about work before Bruce couldn’t stop ignoring the social media mogul who kept trying to flag him down across the room. He sighed and reluctantly told Clark and Lois, “I’d better make the rounds at least once before midnight or all anyone will be talking about tomorrow is what a shitty host I am. You two enjoy yourselves.”

For the next hour, Bruce made small talk with his fellow elites about all the usual things rich people talked about, an eclectic mix of topics ranging from the serious (the new president-elect, climate change, the real estate market and the stock market, his and others’ charity work, the ongoing trade war with China) to the superficial (facelifts, mansion renovations, luxury cars and luxury fashion, relationship gossip). He hadn’t even noticed midnight was approaching when he happened to run into Clark again, this time without Lois.

“Hey!” Clark shouted over the growing din of noise.

“Where’s Lois?” Bruce asked, looking around to make sure he hadn’t missed her.

Clark shrugged. “Getting another drink, she said, although that was ten minutes ago.”

“Sorry I haven’t been able to spend more time with you.” Bruce took a step into Clark’s personal space so they could hear each other better (and just to be closer to Clark). “I promise you’ll have me all to yourself once everyone leaves.”

“It’s fine,” Clark said, sounding genuine. “I wasn’t expecting you to neglect all your other guests just because I was here. Besides, I’ve had Lois, at least until ten minutes ago. Thanks for inviting us both.”

“You’re welcome,” Bruce tried to say, but the crowd suddenly drowned him out with what Bruce realized was their ongoing countdown: “FIVE… FOUR… THREE… TWO… ONE!”

Everyone erupted into drunken cheers, jostling Bruce and Clark in their excitement, knocking them into each other. Clark laughed good-naturedly, and even amid the chaos, that laugh sent a thrill down Bruce’s spine, like it always had.

“Happy New Year,” Clark said, wrapping his arms around Bruce’s shoulders.

“Happy New Year,” Bruce parroted, and though he’d never been one for traditions, he kissed Clark deeply in the first seconds of a brand new year.

It was four in the morning by the time everyone else left Wayne Manor. Bruce led Clark up the spiral staircase to his bedroom.

“How many bedrooms are in this house?” Clark asked as they passed closed doors on the way to Bruce’s. “I’m just curious.”

“Ten total, including Alfred’s, which is in another part of the house.”

“So yours, Alfred’s, and eight guest rooms,” Clark counted. “Have you ever had enough guests to fill them all?”

“I haven’t. They’re a complete waste of space.” Bruce paused, then added, “Although technically there are only seven guest rooms. We kept my parents’ room the same.”  _ After their death _ , he didn’t say, but it was implied.

“Seven is still a lot of guest rooms.”

Bruce debated leaving it there, taking the out Clark had graciously given him, but he hadn’t stopped thinking about what Alfred had told him about confiding in Clark. He couldn’t tell Clark he was Batman. He wanted to trust Clark, but he didn’t want to put that trust to the test with his most dangerous secret of all. Clark was a journalist, after all. Bruce didn’t think Clark would broadcast his secret identity to the world, but unless he could be one hundred percent certain of that, he wasn’t going to risk everything by sharing that part of himself.

But he could share another part of himself. And maybe sharing this part would help Clark understand, once their relationship failed, why Bruce was the way he was, and why he couldn’t have a successful long-term relationship. Why he found it so difficult to open up and let someone into his life, to trust someone fully, to fall in love.

Decision made, he spoke up before he could change his mind. “I know I said I appreciate that you haven’t tried to force me to talk about them.” They both knew who he meant. His parents. “And I do. But… I can. I think we’ve been together long enough that you deserve to know.”

That was another aspect of it. Clark had been nothing but good to him. He wasn’t flawless – he still occasionally flaked out on their dates when a work emergency came up – but he was damn close. He’d never complained about Bruce’s lack of commitment, never tried to have the “define the relationship” talk beyond establishing that they wouldn’t see other people, never pushed him to do anything he wasn’t comfortable with. He did deserve to know.

But Clark disagreed. “You don’t owe me any information about your parents,” he insisted. “You don’t have to tell me anything you don’t want to.”

“It’s not that I want to,” Bruce said slowly, coming to the realization as he spoke. “But I think I might need to.” He paused. “It would explain a lot.”

Clark seemed to consider him for a long time before he spoke. “Okay. Then… can you tell me what happened? I’ve read about it, but I want to hear it from your perspective.”

Bruce told him. The only time he’d laid it out like this for anyone was with the therapist Alfred had sent him to after the fact, and even then it had taken a great deal of coaxing and Bruce had been thin on the details. This time, he tried not to be.

He told Clark about the show they’d gone to see; Bruce couldn’t remember the plot, only the way the crowd had risen in a standing ovation while the actors on stage bowed. He remembered leaving the theater exhausted, holding tight to his mother’s hand so he wouldn’t lose her or his father in the crowd. He remembered that Alfred had offered to drive them there, but his father didn’t like to be driven, he liked to be behind the wheel, so they’d taken the Bentley and parked in a garage a few blocks away.

They took a shortcut through an alley. It was dark, and quiet. The lights and sounds of the street faded behind them. The fire escapes to the left and right of them cast shadows when the moon emerged from behind the clouds. His mother’s heels clacked against the pavement. His father was laughing about something, a laugh that cut off abruptly when a masked man emerged from the shadows, gun trained on the three of them, and demanded their wallets.

Bruce’s father went still. His voice was steady and reasonable, but the tremor in his hands as he ushered his wife and child behind him betrayed his fear. He reached into his pocket and nodded at Martha to reach into her purse.

When he reached his hand out to throw their wallets at the mugger’s feet, the first shot rang out.

It was so loud it left Bruce’s ears ringing. His mother’s cry was a muffled echo. She threw both arms out, one to catch Thomas as he fell – his dead weight buckled her knees – the other to shield Bruce. He remembered her perfectly manicured nails. He remembered her lipstick.

Bruce still wasn’t sure how much time passed between the first and second shot. It could have been less than a second, the time stretched out like taffy. But the second shot came, and his mother crumpled in on herself like a marionette. Bruce screamed, a terrible sound wrenched from his chest; it took him a second to realize it had come from him and not somewhere else.

The mugger turned and ran. Bruce had never seen his face. He’d barely heard him speak. He’d spent years tracking the man down with almost nothing to go on, prowling the streets of Gotham with vengeance in his heart, convinced he would recognize the man based on a feeling alone.

He’d never found him.

For years after that night, Bruce would wonder why he had survived, would wish more than anything else on earth that there had been a third shot to follow the first two. But there hadn’t been, and Bruce’s parents had left him behind, and he’d never been able to bring himself to finish what the mugger had started, knowing how it would make Alfred feel, knowing the man who’d killed his parents was still out there.

When he’d finished, Clark reached out tentatively, placed a hand over Bruce’s. He didn’t say anything for a long time, just sat there beside him. “Thanks for telling me,” he said, and he wouldn’t meet Bruce’s eyes, and there was something in his voice that Bruce couldn’t quite identify, and Bruce wondered if telling the story of his parents had convinced Clark that Bruce was too irrevocably fucked up to ever make a good long-term partner. Would this be what ended their relationship, just as Bruce was starting to feel like this thing they had was something he might not be able to live without?

Clark spent the night again, and Bruce stayed awake the whole time wondering.


	14. Chapter 14

In the first weeks of the new year, it became even more clear that  _ something _ had changed between Bruce and Clark when Bruce had opened up about his parents, and that it had changed for the worse.

Clark left the Manor just as Bruce had finally started to drift off; it was already late morning, judging by the level of light peeking through the cracks in Bruce’s blackout curtains. Bruce was just conscious enough to register that Clark was leaving before sleep claimed him.

He awoke so late in the afternoon that it was practically evening. He had a single text from Clark, thanking him again for inviting him and Lois for New Year’s. No mention of making any future plans. They didn’t always make plans right away, so this didn’t strike Bruce as anything out of the ordinary.

“Actually, I’ll probably have to work late every day this week,” Clark said. “There’s a lot to write about with the inauguration coming up.”

“What about sometime this weekend?” Bruce asked.

“Um…” Clark paused like he was thinking about his schedule. “This weekend’s not good for me either. I’m sorry.”

“It’s fine,” Bruce said. They were both busy people. Scheduling time together wasn’t easy. “I’ll see you eventually, then.”

“Yeah.” It was hard to tell over the phone, but Bruce thought Clark sounded a little uncomfortable. Still, he didn’t question it.

He didn’t question anything until another two weeks had passed of Clark being constantly “busy.” He always had good excuses – a looming deadline, a coworker’s birthday – but as the excuses piled up, Bruce started to get suspicious, and he returned to the paranoid thoughts that had plagued him on New Year’s: Something was wrong. Bruce had done something, he shouldn’t have opened up to Clark as quickly as he had, or as much as he had. Had he gone into too much detail? He’d tried to stick to the night of his parents’ death, had only alluded to the depression that had followed, and lingered; he hadn’t even gone into his misguided quest for vengeance, because that would have meant saying or at least implying that he fought crime by night, which would have been a dead giveaway. But maybe it had been enough for Clark to decide he wasn’t equipped to handle Bruce.

Bruce’s paranoia spiraled when he got a text from Clark, and although Bruce had very little experience with relationships, he knew enough to worry when the message started with  _ We need to talk. _

He met Clark in Metropolis. Clark buzzed him into his apartment and met him at his front door. He offered Bruce something to drink – coffee, alcohol – and Bruce declined. He didn’t want to dance around the inevitable. He didn’t want to linger after everything was over.

They sat at Clark’s tiny kitchen table and Clark looked at him like he was about to tell him his dog had died. He looked miserable. Bruce felt miserable. This was exactly why he should have ended things with Clark earlier. This was exactly what he’d wanted to avoid.

Clark’s first words weren’t exactly what Bruce had expected, but they weren’t promising, either: “I haven’t been completely honest with you.”

Bruce’s overactive mind ran through every worst-case scenario, every terrible way this could end. Outwardly, he kept his cool. If this was the end, Bruce wanted to keep at least some of his dignity intact. He remembered that mug Clark had jokingly promised to get him: “World’s Most Accommodating Boyfriend.” Accommodating. He could still be that. So he just said, “I don’t expect you to tell me everything.”

“No,” Clark said, guilt plain on his features, “But when you opened up to me about your parents…”

So that’s what this was. Bruce had finally been somewhat honest with Clark, and had inadvertently guilted Clark into revealing that he’d been lying to Bruce this whole time. “I didn’t do that because I expected something from you in return,” Bruce said. He didn’t think this had to necessarily be a deal breaker. After all, it wasn’t like he hadn’t lied to Clark, wasn’t  _ still  _ lying to Clark.

“I know. But if you trust me enough to tell me about that night, then I should trust you enough to tell you this.”

Clark got to his feet, and Bruce was about to follow, assuming Clark was about to lead him somewhere else in the apartment, but no, Clark stayed where he was. One of his hands reached up to remove his glasses and the other started unbuttoning his shirt.

At the first flash of bright, primary blue, Bruce knew.

Just like in the alley that night all those years ago, the time stretched out like taffy, Bruce’s mind running a mile a minute to process what he’d just realized, what he now felt sure he should have fucking realized months ago, if not from the very beginning.

He thought about all the times he’d seen Clark without his glasses. He thought about Clark flaking out on their dates at the last minute to attend to some “work emergency.” He thought about the first fucking moment he’d laid eyes on Clark, how the resemblance had been instant and uncanny.

He was an idiot.

“Fuck,” he said, summing up everything he felt in a single word.

Clark had now fully unbuttoned his shirt, revealing the Superman logo underneath. He floated a few inches off the floor, remained there for a few long moments, then dropped silently back to earth. “I know it’s a lot to take in,” he said, and he looked fucking  _ terrified _ . It wasn’t an emotion Bruce was used to seeing on the face of Superman. It didn’t look right.

Bruce turned away, because he couldn’t keep looking at Clark – at  _ Superman _ – like this, couldn’t keep staring down this stark reminder of his own ignorance. “I should have fucking known,” he said bitterly, not angry at Clark but at himself.

“You can’t think like that,” Clark reassured him, but the words were hollow, because  _ Clark _ didn’t know either, did he? He didn’t know that Bruce Wayne wasn’t just Bruce Wayne, intelligent and rich but otherwise completely normal guy. He didn’t know Bruce Wayne was  _ supposed _ to be the World’s Greatest Detective. The World’s Greatest Detective who’d failed to piece together the clues that had been staring him in the face this entire time. Oblivious, Clark continued, “I’ve kept this a secret from almost everyone in my life. Only my parents and Lois know, and Lois only because she’s the most brilliant investigative reporter I know and spent years figuring it out. But I thought you deserved to know.”

As the initial realization of how fucking  _ stupid _ he’d been washed over him, Bruce came to a second realization of what it meant for him, that Clark Kent was Superman. That he’d gone out into the world with the intention of choosing someone to help him get over his inconvenient feelings for Superman and, by some miracle of statistics, had unknowingly chosen Superman himself.

It was too much. Bruce held up a hand. “Clark,” he said firmly, still unable to look him in the eye. “Stop.”

Even in his peripheral vision, Bruce could tell Clark was devastated. He knew he’d probably feel guilty about that later, but he wasn’t going to dwell on it now. He already had too much to process. “If you need time to think about it…” Clark said tentatively.

“I do.”

“Okay.” Clark took a breath. “I understand.” Then, with the utmost seriousness, “And you understand that you can’t tell anyone about this?”

Oh, if only Clark knew exactly how well he understood. “Of course I understand that.”

Bruce snatched his keys off the table and stood, made a beeline for Clark’s front door. Before he could walk out, Clark added one more thing that was just the cherry on top of the insane sundae Bruce’s day had become:

“I trust you, Bruce.”

Bruce sped the whole way home, daring any cop to pull him over. He made it to Gotham in record time and stormed into the manor, ignoring Alfred’s concerned and curious gaze and heading straight down to the Batcave.

He couldn’t believe he hadn’t realized. He wondered if a part of him had known, deep down, but hadn’t wanted to acknowledge it, because it would have meant giving up Clark, and apparently he was incapable of doing that. Apparently he hadn’t gotten over Superman at all. It was possible he never would.

After a few nights of nonstop thinking about it, Bruce finally accepted that there was nothing he could do about the fact that he hadn’t realized Clark was Superman. He couldn’t go back in time and undo his own stupidity. It had happened.

Now he had to decide what he was going to do about it.

That part took longer. Every one of Bruce’s deepest instincts shouted at him to get out. It was just as he’d initially feared; it was too fucking complicated. It was even more complicated than he could have imagined, and  _ that _ was saying something.

A relationship between Bruce Wayne and Clark Kent would never have worked out. A relationship between Batman and Superman was even more doomed.

But then again, when had Bruce ever been the type to abandon a mission simply because it seemed doomed to fail? What chance did he have of bringing real justice to Gotham, of permanently changing the city for the better? And still he refused to give up.

He thought about it for days, weeks, and when he finally came to a conclusion, he gave Clark a call.

Clark picked up immediately. Bruce cut straight to the chase. “Can you come to Gotham tonight?”

“Sure,” Clark said, all pretense of being “busy with work” gone in an instant. “Do you want me to meet you at the manor?”

“Yes.”

“What time do you want me to be there?”

“How soon can you be here?”

“In a few minutes.”

Of course. Superman. Super speed. “I’ll meet you at the front door.”

True to his word, Clark arrived at the manor faster than a speeding bullet. When Bruce opened the door, he looked frantic. “What do you need?” he asked. “Is something wrong?”

“Nothing’s wrong,” Bruce reassured him, because they weren’t going to get anywhere if Clark was in Concern Mode the entire time. “Follow me.”

He led Clark to the study, stood pensively in front of the bookshelf that opened into the secret passageway leading down to the Batcave. He’d given this plenty of thought, of course he had, but he still had his doubts. But it wasn’t like Clark – like Superman – had left him with much of a choice.

“I thought about what you told me,” he said slowly. “I still think I should have known. But either way, I can’t justify keeping this a secret from you any longer, now that I know.”

He opened the secret passageway. Clark watched him, his expression guarded, like he wasn’t sure what to think or how to feel about what was happening. Bruce met his eyes. 

“You’ve never used your x-ray vision in my house,” he said. He was sure about that. Clark would have figured him out in an instant if he had.

“I wouldn’t violate your privacy like that,” Clark assured him, but his focus was still on the entrance that, he would soon find out, led down to the Batcave. “Bruce, what is this?”

Bruce didn’t want to tell him. He wanted to show him. So he just said, “I think you’ll put it together quickly,” and he led Clark down into the cave.

He was right. It didn’t take long for realization to dawn on Clark’s features. They were surrounded by Bruce’s high-tech gadgets and vehicles, by huge monitors mounted on the walls displaying feeds from security cameras around Gotham. Clark stopped in his tracks, speechless.

“Bruce,” he finally said, like it was the only word he could remember.

“You’re an investigative journalist with super senses,” Bruce said. “I’m supposed to be the World’s Greatest Detective. This hasn’t been our finest moment.”

Clark shook his head. “I think… a part of me knew. Or should have known. When you fractured your ribs.”

Now he knew how Bruce felt. “The number of times I saw you without your glasses,” Bruce said, caught between frustration and the urge to laugh at the ridiculousness of it all.

Apparently Clark chose the latter. He laughed, loud and unrestrained. The sound echoed off the walls of the Batcave. Bruce remembered the first time he’d heard it, how in an instant his decision was made.  _ This one,  _ he’d thought. This was the person he’d use to get over Superman.

If only he’d known.

“You’re right,” Clark agreed. “Not our finest moment.” He leaned against the rough stone walls, shot Bruce a look that was half-amused and half-overwhelmed. “I assume you’ve figured out who I was talking about, on our camping trip. When I told you about how I started seeing you to get over someone. That someone was… you, apparently.”

Bruce had figured as much. He couldn’t believe it had been almost a full year since Superman had confessed his feelings. How much trouble could they have spared if Bruce had been honest with him about how he felt from the beginning?

Which led Bruce to his next point. “If we’re finally being honest with each other, being Batman isn’t the only thing I lied to you about. It seems we started dating each other to get over… each other.”

“What do you mean?”

This was it. No going back.

But then again, there never had been any going back. Bruce just hadn’t known it.

“You asked me if I had feelings for you.” Bruce paused, took a breath. “I lied.”

Clark leaned his head back to look at the ceiling. Bats flitted back and forth, their distant high-pitched screeching white noise behind their revealing conversation. “I knew you would do that,” Clark said. “Because it would have been too ‘complicated.’” He turned back to Bruce. “I think it’s too late for us to avoid things getting complicated.”

That was what Bruce had ultimately concluded. So shit would be complicated. So it might not work out. So what? He’d already wasted too much time denying himself what he wanted.

“I agree.” He reached out, took one of Clark’s hands in his to draw him nearer. “Turns out I don’t mind complicated.”

Clark tilted his head, then grinned. They leaned forward together and their mouths met in a searing kiss.

Bruce couldn’t begin to count how many times they’d kissed over the past several months, but this time was undeniably different, and not just because Clark took him in his arms and lifted them off the floor, sending a thrill of adrenaline down Bruce’s spine. The part of him that had always felt conflicted about their relationship had disappeared, that too-loud voice insisting what they were doing wrong was conspicuously silent. All that was left was the unshakeable knowledge that this thing he had, this thing he’d stumbled into, was absolutely, unquestionably  _ right _ .

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I hope you all enjoyed the story! Thank you all for your lovely comments; I love reading them! I have another Superbat story idea I want to write next (here’s a hint: mutual pining), and I also have a story idea for another fandom that I’ve been meaning to get to forever (Harry Potter fans stay tuned).
> 
> Thanks for reading!


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